Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 8, No. 46, August, 1861 | Page 5

conclude, therefore, that a primitive forest must contain but a very
small proportion of perfect trees: these are, for the most part, the
occupants of land cleared by cultivation, and may be found also among
the sparse growth of timber that has come up in pasture land, where the
constant browsing of cattle prevents the formation of any dense
assemblages.
In the opinion of Whately, grandeur is the prevailing character of a
forest, and beauty that of a grove. This distinction may seem to be
correct, when such collections of wood exhibit all their proper
characters: but perfectly unique forms of wood are seldom found in this
country, where almost all the timber is of spontaneous growth. We
have genuine forests; but other forms of wood are of a mixed character,
and we have rather fragments of forest than legitimate groves. In the
South of Europe many of the woods are mere plantations, in which the
trees were first set in rows, with straight avenues, or vistas, passing
directly through them from different points. In an assemblage of this
kind there can be nothing of that interesting variety observed in a
natural forest, and which is manifestly wanting even in woods planted
with direct reference to the attainment of these natural appearances. "It
is curious to see," as Gilpin remarks, "with what richness of invention,
if I may so speak, Nature mixes and intermixes her trees, and shapes
them into such a wonderful variety of groups and beautiful forms. Art
may admire and attempt to plant and to form combinations like hers;
but whoever observes the wild combinations of a forest and compares

them with the attempts of Art has little taste, if he do not acknowledge
with astonishment the superiority of Nature's workmanship."
When a tract is covered with a dense growth of tall trees, especially of
Pines, which have but little underbrush, the wood represents overhead a
vast canopy of verdure supported by innumerable lofty pillars. No one
could enter these dark solitudes without feeling a deep impression of
sublimity, especially if it be an hour of general stillness of the winds.
The voices of animals and of birds, particularly the hammering of the
woodpecker, serve to magnify our perceptions of grandeur. A very
slight sound, during a calm in one of these deep woods, like the ticking
of a clock in a vast hall, has a distinctness almost startling, especially if
there be but little undergrowth. These feeble sounds afford one a more
vivid sense of the magnitude of the place than louder sounds, that differ
less from those we hear in the open plain. The canopy of foliage
overhead and the absence of undergrowth are favorable to those
reverberations which are so perceptible in a Pine wood.
In a grove we experience different sensations. Here pleasantness and
cheerfulness are combined, and the feeling of grandeur is excited only
perhaps by the sight of some noble tree. In a grove the trees are
generally well formed, many of them being nearly perfect in their
proportions. Their shadows are cast separately upon the ground, which
is green beneath them as in an orchard. If we look upon them from a
near eminence, we observe a variety of outlines, and may identify the
different species by their shape, while in the forest we see one
unbroken mass of foliage. A wild-wood is frequently converted into a
grove by clearing it of undergrowth and leaving the space a grassy lawn.
It may then yield us shade, coolness, and other agreeable sensations of
a cultivated wood, but the individual trees always retain their gaunt and
imperfect shapes.
The greater part of the woodland of this country partakes of the
characters of both forest and grove, exhibiting a pleasant admixture of
each, combined with pasture and thicket. In Great Britain the woods are
chiefly groves and parks: a wild-wood of spontaneous growth is now
rare in that country, once renowned for the extent and beauty of its
forests. Most of our American woods are fragments of forest,
particularly in the Western States, where they stand out prominently,
and deform the landscape by presenting a perpendicular front of naked

pillars, unrelieved by any foliage. They remind one of those houses, in
the city, which have been cut asunder to widen a street, leaving the
interior rooms and partition-walls exposed to view. These sections of
wood are the grand picturesque deformity of a country lately cleared. In
the older settlements, a recent growth of wood has in many instances
come up outside of these palisades, serving in a measure to conceal
their baldness.
The most lovely appearances in landscape are caused by the
spontaneous growth of miscellaneous trees, some in dense assemblages
and some in scattered groups, with here and there a few single trees
standing