Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 8, No. 46, August, 1861 | Page 7

a flora as well as a fauna of their
own. The same shrubs and herbaceous plants, for example, are not
common to Oak and to Pine woods. There is a difference also in the
cleanness and beauty of their stems. The gnarled habit of the Oak is
conspicuous even in the most crowded forest, and coniferous woods are
apt to be disfigured by dead branches projecting from the bole. The
Birch, the Poplar, and the Beech are remarkable for the straightness,
evenness, and beauty of their shafts, when assembled in a dense wood.
Some of the most beautiful forests in high latitudes consist of White
Canoe-Birches. We see them in Massachusetts only in occasional
groups, but farther north, upon river-banks, they form woods of
considerable extent and remarkable beauty; and with their tall shafts,
and their smooth white bark, resembling pillars of marble, supporting a
canopy of bright green foliage, on a light feathery spray, they constitute
one of the picturesque attractions of a Northern tour. Nature seems to
indicate the native habitat of this noble tree by causing its exterior to
bear the whiteness of snow, and it would be difficult to estimate its
importance to the aboriginal inhabitants of Northern latitudes. Yellow
Birch woods are not inferior in their attractions: individual trees of this
species are often distinguished among other forest timber by extending
their feathery summits above the level of the other trees.
The small White Birch is never assembled in large forest groups. Like
the Alder, it seems to be employed by Nature for the shading of her
living pictures, and for producing those gradations which are the charm
of spontaneous wood-scenery. In this part of the continent, a Pitch-Pine
wood is commonly fringed with White Birches, and outside of these
with a lower growth of Hazels, Cornels, and Vacciniums, uniting them
imperceptibly with the herbage of the plain. The importance of this
native embroidery is not sufficiently considered by those industrious
plodders who are constantly destroying wayside shrubbery, as if it were

the pest of the farm,--nor by those "improvers," on the other hand, who
wage an eternal warfare against little spontaneous groups of wood, as if
they thought everything outside of the forest an intruder, if it was
planted by accident, and had not cost money before it was placed there.
Give me an old farm, with its stone-walls draped with Poison-Ivy and
Glycine, and verdurous with a mixed array of Viburnums, Hazels, and
other wild shrubbery, harboring thousands of useful birds, and smiling
over the abundant harvests which they surround, before the finest
artistical landscape in the world!
Pines are remarkably social in their habit, and cover immense tracts in
high latitudes, extending southward, on this continent, as far as the very
boundary of the tropics, where they are found side by side with the
Dwarf Palm of Florida. But in the region of the true Palms the Pine is
wanting. It is worthy of remark, however, that in the fossil vegetation
of the Eocene world these two vegetable tribes are found associated.
This fact, it seems to me, should be attributed to the mixing of the
mountain Pines with the Palms of the sea-level, during that revulsion of
Nature by which they were hurled into the same chaotic heap. We are
not obliged to infer from their contiguity in these geological remains,
that the two species ever flourished together in the same region.
Pine woods possess attractions of a peculiar kind: all lovers of Nature
are enraptured with them, and there is a grandeur about them which is
felt at once, when we enter them. Their dark verdure, their deep shade,
their lofty height, and their branches which are ever mysteriously
murmuring, as they are swayed by the wind, render them singularly
solemn and sublime. This expression is increased by the hollow
reverberating interior of the wood, caused by its clearness and freedom
from underbrush. The ground beneath is covered by a matting of fallen
leaves, making a smooth brown carpet, that renders a walk within its
precincts as comfortable as in a garden. The foliage of the Pine is so
hard and durable that in summer we always find the last autumn's crop
lying upon the ground in a state of perfect soundness, and under it that
of the preceding year only partially decayed. The foliage of two
summers, therefore, lies upon the surface, checking the growth of
humble vegetation, and permitting only certain species of plants to
flourish with vigor.
Mushrooms of various forms and sizes spring out of these decayed

leaves, often rivalling the flowers in elegance. Monotropas, uniting
some of the habits of the Fungi with the botanical characters of the
flowering plants, flourish side by side with the snowy Cypripedium and
the singular Coral-Weed. The evergreen Dewberry, a delicate