26 
TREES AS GOOD CITIZENS 
beauty, in the same way that the massive Oaks of the South 
Atlantic and Gulf States have added beauty and value to 
plantation and town. What could be a more grievous 
mental picture than that of Northampton, Greenfield, or 
historic Williamstown, in Massachusetts; picturesque old 
Charlestown, in New Hampshire, or Savannah, Georgia, 
or Mobile, or Tuscaloosa, Ala., or Pass Christian, Miss., 
or any one of scores of other communities, shorn of 
the crowning beauty of these stately veterans of shade? 
The community in which any one of us may live is 
entitled to this asset. That our forefathers failed to 
provide shade for the coming generations is no excuse for 
similar failure on our part. The longer we delay the plant¬ 
ing the more remote will be the time of gaining the bene¬ 
fits of the trees we plant. We can never start any younger. 
This applies to communities and individuals alike. The 
time, therefore, for a beginning is the immediate present. 
