The Bossier banner. [volume] (Bellevue, Bossier Parish, La.) 1859-1952, 1883-06-07


scatter its seeds, every one of these lit
tie vesselsspreads a sail to the breeze,
and it's necessary thatthey be launched
above the grass and weeds, amid which
they would be caught and held did not
the stalk continue to grow and outstrip
the rival vegetation. 1t is curious in
stance of foresight in a weed.
4. People live in the country all their
lives without making one accurate OBJ
servation about nature. The evergreen
trees in front of their doors-what do
they know about their habits? Do the
pine and the hemloek she'd their leavesp
Not in any strict sense. In the decidu-
Gus trees the new leaves takes the place
of the old; they cone out in the axis
of the old leaves, and the branch is re-
Clothed each spring; even if no new
shoots appear. Not so with the pine or
the hemlock; they turn over new leaf
only when they turn over new growth
of wood. The white pine usually sheds
its leaves in midsummer, though I have
known all the pinesto delay It'll Octo-
Der. It's on with the new love before
tits off with the old. From Nav till
near autumn it carries eyo srops of
leaves, last years and the present
yeaz $. Emerson's inquiry,
--how the sacred pine-tre adds
To her old leaves new myriads.
is formed in strict accordalice with the
facts. 1t is to her old leaves that she
adds the new. Only the new growth,
the outermost leaves, are carried over.
till the next season, thus keeping the
trees always clothed and green. As its
molding season approaches, these old
leaves, all the rear ranks on the limbs,
begin to turn yellow, and careless OBJ
server might think the tree was struck
with death; but it is not The decay
stops just where the growth of the.
previous spring began, and presently
the tree is green and vigorous, with a
newly-laid carpet of fallen leaves be-
meath it, But the same is not, true of.
the hemlock, or the spruce, or the red
cedar. These trees do not shed their
leaves periodically, but outgrow them
gradually, as they do their bark, or as
person outgrows or wears out his
clothes, here shred and there shred,
bit to-day or a bit tomorrow, and
were it not for the new growth made
each spring they would, in time, be-
come quite naked. The winds and
storms whip them off, and, as the
branches grow, the old leaves gradually
disappear, leaving naked stem. But
none of the confera renew their leaves
as do the deciduous trees New leaves
come only upon new wood. IF the
tree were to cease to grow it would
probably Though of this am not GER
tain) cease to shed its leaves. The
pines and. frs and spruces differ still
more radically from the deciduous trees.
They have less scope, less versatility.
fewer resources. They never sprout
Cut them down and that is the end.
Cut Off limb and it is never renewed
by new shoot Trim apfne or a hem
lock closely and it will die; it has no
power to start branch de moro, to burst
the bark with a new shoot. A sort of
fatallsm is characteristic of these trees.
The limbs of the white pine tend to re-
cur in regular intervals, like the rounds
OF ladder. As it shoots upward in the I
forest it pulls this ladder up after it, SO
that the tallest trees are limbless for
eighty or ninety feet.
When you cut off the top of a pine or
o spruce, removing tae central and
Ieading shaft, the tree does not develop
and send forth new one to take the
place OF the old, but branch from the
next in rank; that is, from the next
whorl OF limbs, is promoted to take the
lead.
The good observer of nature holds
his eye long and firmly to the point.
as one does when looking at puzzle
picture, and viii not be baffied. The
cat catches the mouse, not merely be- |
cause she watches for him, but because
she is armed to catch him and is quick. |
So the observer finally gets the fact, not
only because he has patience, but be-
cause his eye is sharp and his inference
swift. Many shrewd old farmer looks |
upon the milky-way as a kind of |
Weather-coek, and will tell you that the |
way it points at night indicates the |
direction, of the wind the next day.
So also every new moon is d dry moon
or wet moon-dry if powder-horn
would hang upon the lower limb. wet
II it would not; forgetting the fact that. /
as q rule, when it dry in one part Of
part and vice versa. When he lalls
his hogs in the fall if the pork be very
hard and solid he predicts severe
winter; II soft and loose, the opposite:
again overlooking the fact that the
kind of food and the temperature Of the
fall make the pork hard or make it
soft. SO with hundred other signs.
all the result of hasty and incon1nIete
observations. In most of the opera
tons of nature there is one or more un-
known quantity; to find the exact value
Of this unknown factor is not so easy.
The wool of the sheep, the fur of
animals. the feathers of the fowls, the
husks of the maize, why are they thicker
some seasons than others; what is the
value OF the unknown quantity heref
Does 1t indicate a severe winter an
oroachinge Only observations extend
ne over a series of years could deter
lllle the point How much natieut oh.