Your National Parks, with Detailed Information for Tourists
John Stuart Mill · en
Every tree has the ways of its race. The willow in its appointed place
is ever leaning over watching the endless procession of waters. Does
it wonder whence and whither? The birches are maidens, slender, white,
and fair. The maple has its own excuse for being. The elms arch the
woodland world with cathedral art. Beautiful is the lone silver spruce
lingering among the grand golden lichened crags. The sturdy pines
stand in ever green contentment. The straight spruces and stately firs
point ever upward and never cease to call "Excelsior!" nor to climb
toward their ideal. The oak, full of character, welcomes all seasons
and all weathers. Within the forest, up toward the heights, stands a
tree that wins and holds the heart like a hollyhock. This tree, the
hemlock, is a poem all alone. It is the heroine, the mother spirit of
the woodland world, handsome, richly robed, symmetrical, graceful,
sensitive, and steadfast. She, more than any other tree, appeals to
the eye and the heart. In her upcurving arms and entire expression
there is a yearning. When the world was young she may have been the
first tree to shelter our homeless, wandering race. To-day, when the
wild folk of the outdoors are most beset with cold or storm, they go
trustingly and confidingly to nestle in the hemlock's arms. And
rightly the sequoia is the nobleman of all the forest world.
That sweet singer, the solitaire, is the chorister of the forest. He
puts the woods in song. Hear his woodnotes wild and the Spirit of the
Forest will thrill you! Meditations and memories will throng you. His
matchless melody carries echoes of Orpheus and good tidings from
distant lands where dreams come true. Far away, soft and low, the wood
itself seems to be singing a hopeful song, a rhythm of ages, that you
have heard before. Pictured fairyland unfolds as you listen. In it is
the peace, the poetry, the majesty, and the mystery of the forest.
Go to the trees and get their good tidings. Have an autumn day in the
woods, and beneath the airy arches of limbs and leaves linger in paths
of peace. Speak to the jostling little trees that are so pretty and so
eager. Stand beneath the monarchs, rugged and rich in character. Lie
down upon the brown leaves, and look far away through the slowly
vanishing vistas full of forest, of columns that are filled with
kindest light. Leaves of red, bronze, and gold will rest in the
sunlight, or be falling back to earth without a fear.