Athwart long aisles the sunbeams pierce their way;
High up, the crows are gathering for the night;
The delicate needles fill the air; the jay

Takes through their golden mist his radiant flight;
They fall and fall, till at November's close
The snowflakes drop as lightly-snows on snows.

MEN AND TREES*

BY EDITH M. THOMAS

SOME time since, on an enchanted summer afternoon, I heard the woods utter the following complaint, in tones half whisper, half musical recitative (I do not think I could have been asleep):

We that sway the forest realm,

Oak and chestnut, beech and elm,
Do grow weary standing here
Year by year-long year by year!
Will it never more befall us

We shall hear a master call us,

When our troops shall break their trance
And be joined in nimble dance?

He should lead us up and down,

Drunk with joy from root to crown,

Through the valley, over hill,

Servants unto music's will;

Leaf and nut the earth bestrewing,
Birds their truant nests pursuing -
Merry madness all around

In the trembling air and ground!

* By permission of the publishers, Houghton, Mifflin & Co,

So it chanced (our sages say)
In the bard Amphion's day;
But since he was lost to earth,

None could wake our souls to mirth.
Music, music, music bring,

Blow on flute, and smite the string!
We for revel fare are ripe-

We would dance, but who will pipe?
Now the best of bards alive

In his art so ill doth thrive,

He might try for days together,

And not start one plume of heather.

Truth to say, the only Amphionic music the trees hear nowadays is the ring of the woodman's axe, their only dance a short, giddy reel.

There are spirits of the sylvan and spirits of the open, natural interpreters of the woods and interpreters of the fields. The true spiritual descendants of the Druids are a small minority. How many of us, while loving trees, are also lovers of the mid-forest and deep shade? If not lost in the woods, we are much at a loss there. The surrounding is alien. A latent timorousness akin to superstition starts up and walks with us, advising: Of forests and enchantments drear,

Where more is meant than meets the ear.

This under-meaning or over-meaning of the woods still baffles. Their most gracious invitation and salutation at a little distance are never quite made good when I have stepped across their precincts. Foretaste of their indifference has often kept me a traveler "all around Robin Hood's barn," rather

than through it. Or is it that, not greatly fond of interiors (of woodland interiors, even), I prefer to stand or sit in the strong-pillared portico, and gaze thence far into the mysterious presence-filled sanctuary? Were I within, the preached word would but puzzle my child-like capacity. Such impression I have of the woods in full leaf, roofed over and curtained round. In winter, in early spring, or in late autumn, when the sky's good light keeps me in countenance, my wood-wit is less dull. Looking sunward through these long aisles, I see the dead leaves repeatedly lifted on the awakening wind. The ground itself seems to acquire motion from their fluctuations, and appears now rising, now subsiding, as the wind comes or goes. Are the leaves surely dead? Near by they have a cautionary speech all their own, a continuous "hist" and "sh" sounds distinct from the sonorous wind-march through the tree-tops. Soul of the forest and of all sylvan summers gone, set free by the blown ripe leaves — I flush it, and follow it through the shrill woods!

THE WAYSIDE INNAN APPLE TREE

FROM THE GERMAN

I HALTED at a pleasant inn,

As I my way was wending

A golden apple was the sign,

From knotty bough depending.

Mine host

it was an apple tree

He smilingly received me,

And spread his sweetest, choicest fruit
To strengthen and relieve me.

Full many a little feathered guest

Came through his branches springing;
They hopped and flew from spray to spray,
Their notes of gladness singing.

Beneath his shade I laid me down,
And slumber sweet possessed me;
The soft wind blowing through the leaves
With whispers low caressed me.

And when I rose and would have paid
My host, so open-hearted,

He only shook his lofty head
I blessed him and departed.

FOREST HYMN

BY WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT

THE groves were God's first temples. Ere man learned

To hew the shaft, and lay the architrave,

And spread the roof above them—ere he framed The lofty vault to gather and roll back

The sound of anthems in the darkling wood,

Amidst the cool and silence, he knelt down
And offered to the Mightiest solemn thanks
And supplications.

For his simple heart

Might not resist the sacred influences
That, from the stilly twilight of the place,

And from the gray old trunks that high in heaven
Mingled their mossy boughs, and from the sound
Of the invisible breath that swayed at once
All their green tops, stole over him, and bowed
His spirit with the thought of boundless Power
And inaccessible Majesty.

Ah! why

Should we, in the world's riper years, neglect

God's ancient sanctuaries, and adore

Only among the crowd, and under roofs

That our frail hands have raised? Let me, at least,

Here, in the shadow of this aged wood,

Offer one hymn, thrice happy if it find
Acceptance in his ear.

Father, Thy hand

Hath reared these venerable columns: Thou

Didst weave this verdant roof. Thou didst look down Upon the naked earth, and forthwith rose

All these fair ranks of trees. They in Thy sun Budded, and shook their green leaves in Thy breeze, And shot toward heaven. The century-living crow,