Here I found the Muses’ fountain, And perceived my spirits mounting, And exclaim’d in accents burning, To the tree my eyes upturning, “Venerable tree and vast, Speak to me of ages past! Sylvan monarch of the wold, Tell me of the days of old! Did thy giant boughs o’er-arching View the Roman legions marching? Has the painted Briton stray’d Underneath thy hoary shade? Did some heathen oracle In thy knotty bosom dwell, As in groves of old Dodona, Or the Druid oaks of Mona? Dwelt the outlaw’d foresters Here in ‘otium cum dig.’ While the feather’d choristers In thy branches ‘hopp’d the twig?’ Help me, Nymph! Fawn! Hamadryad! One at once, or all the Triad.” Lo! a voice to my invoking! ’Twas my stupid gardener croaking, “Please, Sir, mayn’t I fall this tree, ’Cos it spoils the crops, you see: And the grass it shades and lumbers, And we shan’t have no _cow_cumbers. Some time it will fall for good, And the Missis wants the wood.” Shock’d at such a scheme audacious, Faint, I gasp’d out, “Goodness gracious!” “Yes,” I said, “the tree must fall, ’Tis, alas! the lot of all; But no mortal shall presume To accelerate its doom. Rescued from thy low desires, It shall warm my poet fires. Let the strokes of fate subdue it, Let the axe of Time cut through it; When it must fall, let it fall, But, oh! never let me view it.” Seeing that my phrase exalted Fell upon his senses vainly, In my full career I halted, And I spoke my orders plainly. “Never seek to trim or lop it, Once for all I charge thee, drop it.” And I added, to my sorrow, “You shall ‘cut your stick’ to-morrow Know what _that_ means, I suppose?” “Yes,” he said, “I thinks I does.” So I left him at this crisis, Left him to his own devices, Left him like the royal Vandal, Leaning on his old spade handle. Oh! those vulgar slang expressions,— How I smart for my transgressions! Judge my wrath, surprise, and horror, When I rose upon the morrow, To behold my tree in ruin, And be told ’twas all _my_ doing, While the villain grinn’d in glee! “Wretch!” I thunder’d, “Where’s my tree?” And these words came from his lips, “There’s the tree, and them’s the Chips.” TRANSFORMATION. THE LAST SPEECH AND CONFESSION OF A MAHOGANY-TREE NYMPH. YOU’VE heard in Greek mythology Of nymph and hamadryad Who had their being in a tree; Perchance, the tale admired. Yet live we, in oblivion sunk; Though strange, my tale’s as sure as That I was once a stately trunk In the forests of Honduras.