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Trees that, like the alder, follow the stream, and hang 
over it with seeming fondness, offer many such asso¬ 
ciations : viewed in one light, they appear the types of 
a grovelling nature; thus Coleridge regarded them. 
“ Shall man,” says he, “ alone stoop? shall his pursuits 
and desires, the reflections of his inward life, be like 
the reflected image of a tree on the edge of a pool, that 
grows downward, and seeks a mock heaven in the un¬ 
stable element beneath it, in neighbourhood with the 
slim water-weeds and oozy bottom-grass, that are yet 
better than itself and more noble, in as far as sub¬ 
stances that appear as shadows are preferable to shadows 
mistaken for substance?” 
To others they present an image of gratitude. The 
very name of the alder imports an acknowledgment of 
benefits conferred; “ its Latin appellation, alnus and 
alnos, being supposed an abridgment of alor amne, — 
‘ I am nourished by the stream.’ ” 
But the most familiar and the most pleasing idea 
they can suggest is that of friendship. Virgil, as we 
have already observed, regarded the alder in this point 
of view; other authors also have treated it in the same 
manner, and indeed it is an idea which would naturally 
and readily occur to the most unimaginative mind. 
G 
