THE TREE FOLK 27 



to carry the fight on into the next generation. What 

 wind-bent and ice-maimed veterans they are; but how 

 defiant! See how a scouting hmb of one of them crept 

 out toward the enemy, and then sprang up full armed 

 like another tree. They are infinitely more picturesque 

 than any of their cousins, captured by some city-bred 

 man for his country seat, and clipped, with malice 

 aforethought, into the form of a spinning top or an 

 umbrella or a spindle of button molds. If such barbering 

 of trees is art, let 's go back to Nature where the blind 

 forces of the air provoke the tree souls to fight for life and 

 so achieve undreamed-of marvels of matchless beauty. 



FRIENDSHIP implies more than a passing acquaint- 

 ance. It is something that germinates and grows, 

 flourishes, blooms, ripens. 



How many times some fashionably dressed woman, 

 painted, powdered, and bejeweled, has said to me, after 

 hearing a lecture about the Tree Folk, ''Oh, I do just 

 adore trees. I wish you could see the oak on my front 

 lawn!" ''What kind of an oak is it?" I ask, full of in- 

 terest at once. "Oh, I don't know; I ought to. I shall 

 have to ask my gardener about that." "Ask your gar- 

 dener!" I feel like shouting; "Ask your gardener! Go 

 home and ask your grandmother the name of your hus- 

 band. I suppose you 'just adore' him, too, don't you?" 

 Some people do not know what love means. 



