Various - The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 06, No. 35, September, 1860

In our studies of Trees, we cannot fail to be impressed with their importance not only to the beauty of landscape, but also in the economy of life; and we are convinced that in no other part of the vegetable creation has Nature done so much to provide at once for the comfort, the sustenance, and the protection of her creatures. They afford the wild animals their shelter and their abode, and yield them the greater part of their subsistence. They are, indeed, so evidently indispensable to the wants of man and brute, that it would be idle to enlarge upon the subject, except in those details which are apt to be overlooked. In a state of Nature man makes direct use of their branches for weaving his tent, and he thatches it with their leaves. In their recesses he hunts the animals whose flesh and furs supply him with food and clothing, and from their wood he obtains the implements for capturing and subduing them. Man's earliest farinaceous food was likewise the product of trees; for in his nomadic condition he makes his bread from the acorn and the chestnut: he must become a tiller of the soil, before he can obtain the products of the cereal herbs. The groves were likewise the earliest temples for his worship, and their fruits his first offerings upon the divine altar.

As man advances nearer to civilization, trees afford him the additional advantage which is derived from their timber. The first houses were constructed of wood, which enables him by its superior plastic nature, compared with stone, to progress more rapidly in his ideas of architecture. Wood facilitates his endeavors to instruct himself in art, by its adaptedness to a greater variety of purposes than any other substance. It is, therefore, one of the principal instruments of civilization which man has derived from the material world. Though the most remarkable works of the architect are constructed of stone, it was wood that afforded man that early practice and experience which initiated him into the laws of mechanics and the principles of art, and carried him along gradually to perfection.

But as man is nomadic before he is agricultural, and a maker of tents and wigwams before he builds houses and temples,—in like manner he is an architect and an idolater before he becomes a student of wisdom; he is a sacrificer in temples and a priest at their altars, before he is a teacher of philosophy or an interpreter of Nature. After the attainment of science, a higher state of mental culture succeeds, causing the mind to see all Nature invested with beauty and fraught with imaginative charms, which add new wonders to our views of creation and new dignity to life. Man now learns to regard trees in other relations beside their capacity to supply his physical and mechanical wants. He looks upon them as the principal ornaments of the face of creation, and as forming the conservatories of Nature, in which she rears those minute wonders of her skill, the flowers and smaller plants that will flourish only under their protection, and those insect hosts that charm the student with their beauty and excite his wonder by their mysterious instincts. Science, too, has built an altar under the trees, and delivers thence new oracles of wisdom, teaching man how they are mysteriously wedded to the clouds, and are thus made the blessed instruments of their beneficence to the earth.

Not without reason did the ancients place the Naiad and her fountain in the shady arbor of trees, whose foliage gathers the waters of heaven into her fount and preserves them from dissipation. From their dripping shades she distributes the waters, which she has garnered from the skies, over the plain and the valley: and the husbandman, before he has learned the marvels of science, worships the beneficent Naiad, who draws the waters of her fountain from heaven, and from her sanctuary in the groves showers them upon the arid glebe and adds new verdure to the plain. After science has explained to us the law by which these supplies of moisture are furnished by the trees, we still worship the beneficent Naiad: we would not remove the drapery of foliage that protects her fountain, nor drive her into exile by the destruction of the trees, through whose leaves she holds mysterious commerce with the skies and saves our fields from drought.

It is in these relations, leaving their uses in economy and the arts untouched, that I would now speak of trees. I would consider them as they appear to the poet and the painter, as they are connected with scenery, and with the romance and mythology of Nature, and as serving the purposes of religion and virtue, of freedom and happiness, of poetry and science, as well as those of mere taste and economy. I am persuaded that trees are closely connected with the fate of nations, that they are the props of industry and civilization, and that in all countries from which the forests have disappeared the people have sunk into indolence and servitude.

Though we may not be close observers of Nature, we cannot fail to have remarked that there is an infinite variety in the forms of trees, as well as in their habits. By those who have observed them as landscape ornaments, trees have been classified according to their shape and manner of growth. They are round-headed or hemispherical, like the Oak and the Plane; pyramidal, like the Pine and the Fir; obeliscal, like the Arbor-Vitæ and Lombardy Poplar; drooping, like the White Elm and the Weeping Willow; and umbrella-shaped, like the Palm. These are the natural or normal varieties in the forms of trees. There are others which may be considered accidental: such are the tall and irregularly shaped trees which have been cramped by growing in a dense forest that does not permit the extension of their lateral branches; such also are the pollards which have been repeatedly cut down or dwarfed by the axe of the woodman.

Of the round-headed trees, that extend their branches more or less at wide angles from their trunk, the Oak is the most conspicuous and the most celebrated. To the mind of an American, however, the Oak is far less familiar than the Elm, as a way-side tree; but in England, where many

this tree, which formerly received divine honors in that country, is now hardly less sacred in the eyes of the inhabitants, on account of their familiarity with its shelter and its shade, and their ideas of its usefulness to the human family. The history of the British Isles is closely interwoven with circumstances connected with the Oak, and the poetry of Great Britain has derived from it many a theme of inspiration.

The Oak is remarkable for the wide spread of its lower branches and its broad extent of shade,—for its suggestiveness of power, and consequent expression of grandeur. It is allied with the romance of early history; it is celebrated by its connection with the religion and religious rites of the Druids,—with the customs of the Romans, who formed of its green leaves the civic crown for their heroes, and who planted it to overshadow the temple of Jupiter; and many ancient superstitions give its name a peculiar significance to the poet and the antiquary. From its timber marine architecture has derived the most important aid, and it has thereby become associated with the grandeur of commerce and the exploits of a gallant navy, and is regarded as the emblem of naval prowess. The Oak, therefore, to the majority of the human race, is, beyond all other trees, fraught with romantic interest, and invested with classic and historical dignity.

The American continent contains a great many species of Oak in its indigenous forest. Of these the White Oak bears the most resemblance to the classical tree, in its general appearance, in the contorted growth of its branches, and in the edible quality of its fruit. But the Red Oak, the most northerly species, exceeds all others in size. No other attains so great a height, or spreads its branches so widely, or surpasses it in regularity of form. As we advance south, the White Oak is conspicuous until we arrive at North Carolina, where the forests and way-sides exhibit the beautiful Evergreen Oak, which, with its slender undivided leaves, the minute subdivisions of its branches, and its general comeliness of form, would be mistaken by a stranger for a Willow. A close inspection, however, would soon convince him that it has none of the fragility of the Willow. On the contrary, it is the most noted of all the genus for its hardness and durability, being the identical Live Oak which has supplied our navy with the most valuable of timber. At the South the Evergreen Oak is a common way-side tree, mingling its hues with the lighter green of the Cypress and the sombre verdure of the Magnolia.