194 
RURAL HOURS. 
grave ; its bone and sinew must crumble into dust long before 
another tree, tall and great as those, shall have grown from the cone 
in our hand. Nay, more, all the united strength of sinew, added 
to all the powers of mind, and all the force of will, of millions of 
men, can do no more toward the work than the poor ability of a 
single arm ; these are of the deeds which time alone can perform. 
But allowing even that hundreds of years hence other trees were 
at length to succeed these with the same dignity of height and 
age, no other younger wood can ever claim the same connection as 
this, with a state of things now passed away forever ; they cannot 
have that wild, stern character of the aged forest pines. This 
little town itself must fall to decay and ruin ; its streets must be- 
come choked with bushes and brambles ; the farms of the valley 
must be anew buried within the shades of a wilderness ; the wild 
deer and the wolf, and the bear, must return from beyond the 
great lakes ; the bones of the savage men buried under our feet 
must arise and move again in the chase, ere trees like those, 
with the spirit of the forest in every line, can stand on the 
same ground in wild dignity of form like those old pines now 
looking down upon our homes. 
Tuesday, 24th. — Thermometer 84 in the shade at three o'clock. 
Still, clear, and dry ; the farmers very anxious for rain. 
Pleasant row in the afternoon ; went down the river. One can- 
not go far, as the mill-dam blocks the way, but it is a pretty little 
bit of stream for an evening row. So near its source, the river is 
quite narrow, only sixty or eighty feet in breadth. The water is 
generally very clear, and of greenish gray ; after the spring thaws 
it sometimes has a bluish tint, and late in autumn, after heavy 
rams, it takes a more decided shade of dark green. It is rarely 
