_July 24th._
The sounds and motions of trees constitute subtle but important
elements of pleasure. It is not enough that a tree have a comely form
as a whole; that it cast a dense shade in the sultry days of summer;
that, perhaps, it yield a nut or fruit; and that, finally, when it
gives up its life to the inevitable ax, its prostrate trunk shall
furnish good timber. Besides these uses of bodily comfort and of
economy, a tree, like a rich-hearted person, has a hundred nameless
ways which we hardly stop to analyze, but which, were they suddenly
taken away, we should miss.
The murmuring of trees is profoundly affecting to a sensitive spirit.
In some moods of imagination one cannot help feeling that trees have a
low song, or a conversation of leaves. They whisper, or speak, or cry
out, and even roar. No one knows this last quality so well as those
who have been in old oak forests in a storm, with violent wind. A
dense forest opposes such a resistance to the free passage of the air,
that the sound is much deadened. But in a park or oak-opening, where
spaces are left for the motion of the air, and among open-branched
trees, a storm moves with such power and majesty, that not even the
battles of thunder-clouds are more sublime, and, under certain
circumstances, it becomes terrific. At the beginning of the tempest,
the trees sway and toss as if seeking to escape; as the violence
increases, the branches bounce back, the leaves, turning their white
under sides to the light, fairly scream. The huge boughs creak and
strain like a ship in a storm. Now and then some branches which have
grown across each other are drawn back and forth, as if demons were
scraping infernal bass-viols. Occasionally a branch breaks with a wild
crash, or some infirm tree, caught unawares in a huge puff of the
storm, goes down with crashing as it falls, and with a thunder-stroke
when it reaches the ground. I would go farther to hear a storm-concert
in an old forest, than any music that man ever made. No one who is
familiar with forest sounds but is sure, when he hears Beethoven’s
music, that much of it was inspired by the sounds of winds among
trees.
There are milder joys, however, in tree converse. Only this morning I
awakened to hear it rain. That steady splash of drops which a
northeast wind brings on is not easily mistaken. I flatter myself that
my ear is too well trained to all the ordinary sounds of nature to be
easily deceived. I rise, and throw back the blinds, when lo! not a
drop is falling. It is the wind in my maple-trees. I had thought of
that, and listened with the most discriminating attention, and was
sure that it was rain!
Twice in our life we lived in houses built on the edge of the original
forests. These had been thinned out, and recesses opened up. It
happened in both cases that an ash and a hickory had been left, which
shot up, without side branches, to a great height. The trunks were
supple and tough. Whenever the winds moved gently, these long and
lithe trees moved with singular grace and beauty. As there was no
perceptible wind along the ground, their movements seemed voluntary.
And yet there was in it that kind of irresolution which one sees in
sleep-walking. But as soon as the breath became a breeze, the wide
circles through which these rooted gymnasts moved was wonderful. They
seemed going forth in every direction, and yet surely and quickly
springing back to position again. And in every motion, such was their
elasticity, they manifested the utmost grace. The sighing of winds in
a pine forest has no parallel sound except upon the sea-shore. Of all
sounds of leaves it is the sweetest and saddest, to certain moods of
summer leisure.
The pine sings, like the poet, with no every-day voice, but in a tone
apart from all common sounds. It has the power to change the
associations, and to quicken the poetic sensibility, as no other
singing tree can do. Every one should have this old harper, like a
seer or a priest among trees, about his dwelling. Under an old pine
would naturally be found the young maiden, whose new lover was far
across the seas. In the sounds that would descend she could not fail
to hear the voices of the sea,—the roar of winds, the plash of waves
running in upon the shore. A young mother, whose first-born had
returned to God who gave it, would go at twilight to the pines; for,
to her ear, the whole air must needs seem full of spirit voices. They
would sing to her thoughts in just such sad strains as soothe sorrow.
Nor would it be strange if, in the rise and fall of these sylvan
syllables, she should imagine that she heard her babe again, calling
to her from the air.
Every country place should have that very coquette among trees, the
aspen. It seems never to sleep. Its twinkling fingers are playing in
the air at some arch fantasy almost without pause. If you sit at a
window with a book, it will wink and blink, and beckon, and coax, till
you cannot help speaking to it! That must be a still day that does not
see the aspen quiver! A single leaf sometimes will begin to wag, and
not another on the whole tree will move. Sometimes a hidden breath
will catch at a lower branch, then, shifting, will leave that still,
while it shakes a topmost twig. Though the air may move so gently that
your cheek does not feel it, this sensitive tree will seem all a
shiver, and turn its leaves upward with shuddering chill. It is the
daintiest fairy of all the trees. One should have an aspen on every
side of his house, that no window should be without a chance to look
upon its nods and becks, and to rejoice in its innocent witcheries. I
have seen such fair sprites, too, in human form. But one does not get
off so easily, if he sports too much with them. The aspen leaf makes
no wounds. Its frolics spin no silken threads which one cannot follow,
and which will not break!
The musical qualities of trees have not been considered enough, in
planting around our dwellings. The great-leaved magnolias have no fine
sound. Willows have but little. Cedars, yew-trees, and Lombardy
poplars are almost silent. It is said that the Lombardy poplar is the
male tree, the female having never come over. It is very likely. It is
stiff enough to be an old bachelor. It spreads out no side branches.
Its top dies early. It casts a penurious shadow.
But my hand is tired. The winds move; all the leaves call me. Let me
go forth.
This ocean above me is sure to cure trouble. The winds sound, the
trees sing. My soul yearns. Its thoughts and moods below may roll like
a disturbed sea; but, drawn up into the heavenly air, like the waters
of the sea, they forget their wrath, and descend again in gentle dews
and nourishing rains.