484 
ON FOREST-TREES. 
mens, are only to be found (with rare exceptions,) in the parks of 
the wealthy, and in the few chase-like forests which still remain, of 
the numbers that flourished in the olden time. Various reasons operate 
against the existence of perfect specimens of trees in small estates, 
but the principal cause is, that our love of money exceeds our love of 
trees. Every inch of cultivatible earth is turned to the best account; 
—“ trees injure our crops by their drip”—therefore we either grub 
them up; or lop and mutilate the branches of those lovely denizens 
of our fields, to obtain fuel for our fires; and “ fine sticks of timber ’ 
to be sold to the highest bidder. 
How frequently too is our bad taste, as well as love of gain, made 
conspicuous, in the manner of pruning a tree : limbs are amputated, 
with a barbarous indifference to the effect produced by equal balanc¬ 
ing ; —as a surgeon might take away antagonist muscles from the 
human frame, leaving “ lob”-sided patients to halt through the world. 
Gilpin—the picturesque writer par excellence ,—justly observes “ a 
tree must be well balanced, to be beautiful, it may have form, and it 
may have lightness, and yet lose all its effect by wanting a proper 
poise. 
The opening section of Gilpin’s charming work—the “ Forest 
scenery”—offers a fund of tasteful remark, and close observation ; — 
he thus begins his book. 
“ It is no exaggerated praise to call a tree the grandest and most 
beautiful, of all the productions of the earth. In the former of these 
epithets, nothing contends with it; for we consider rocks and moun¬ 
tains as part of the earth itself. And though among inferior plants, 
shrubs and flowers, there is great beauty ; yet when we consider that 
these minuter productions are chiefly beautiful as individuals; and 
are not adapted to form the arrangement of composition in land¬ 
scape ; nor to receive the effects of light and shade; they must give 
place in point of beauty,—of picturesque beauty at least, which we 
are here considering—to the form and foliage, and ramification of the 
tree. Thus the splendid tints of the insect, however beautiful, must 
yield to the elegance and proportion of animals, which range in a 
higher class. 
With animal life, I should not set the tree in competition. The 
shape, the different colored fur, the varied and spirited altitudes, the 
character, and motion, which strike us in the animal creation, are 
certainly beyond still life, in its most pleasing appearance. I should 
only observe with regard to trees, that nature has been kinder to 
them in point of variety, than even to its living forms. Though 
every auimal is distinguished from its fellow, by some little variation 
