St. Johnsbury Caledonian. [volume] (St. Johnsbury, Vt.) 1867-1919, 1896-05-01
the folio which make up the book came
to us also from the trees

w US ulsO lrOm tHe trees.
Gas said, it was my environment
which suggested to me in 1872 the des-
ignation of a day for the planting of
trees. The suggestion was adopted by
the people of Nebraska with such zeal
in establishing woodlands where they
found only the monotony Of plain that
today the state stands foremost in prac-
tical forestry among all the members Of
the American Union. And the celebra-
ton Of Arbor day is now general
throughout the United States.
"Have you never noticed the wonder
full similitudes between tree life and
human life?" said the secretary. "They
are almost innumerable. They have
been recognized in all ages, and man s
metaphors for all that is beautiful,
useful, desirable and immortal have
been drawn largely, since written Ian
guage began, from sylvan life The
tree of knowledge, the tree of lib.
erty, tree of everlasting life have
been planted in all poesy. They have
bloomed in all literature from the re-
hottest Of historic times. Books not
drawing smile, metaphor or other fig
ure of speech from tree life have been
rare indeed.
Developing this idea of the similitude
between tree life and human life, the
secretary said: "An arboretum is to
tree culture what a university is to
mental life. The skilled forester gathers
in the former all varieties of trees,
studies the habits and requirements of
each and stimulates growth and defines
forms by all the appliances of his art.
In the universities are collected human
intellects of all types and all degrees Of
strength and quickness. Here, as among
the trees, are all the memorable and in
effaceable results Of the operations of
the law Of heredity. Here, as in the
arboretum, though nurture may do
much, nature does most. The cotton
wood can never become an oak, but it
can pass the oak in the race for matu-
rity. 1t can even aid the oak to become
more stately in form, to grow straighter
and taller than when left to itself with
out the competition Of more swiftly
shooting trees.
cat Arbor Lodge, my home, plant
ed in 1865 long row Of black walnuts
between two ranks of swiftly growing
soft wood trees-maple on one side and
On ho of
30 years | have watched the walnuts
growing symmetrically and beautifully
to great height in their struggle to reach
the light up and beyond the shade Of
their less valued contemporaries and
co-tenants. They are higher, better trees
than they would have been without the
rivalry Of their neighbors-their class
mates. So mind by contact with mind
and struggle Of brain with brain is i'm
proved. The mediocrity of one is almost
obliterated by contests with the superb
GRITTY of another,
"And as arboretums are developing
the infant forests, nursing tremendous
timbers whence masts and spars and
stills and joists shall emerge into swiftly
sailing ships and massive marts of trade
which are to convey and cover the COM
merce of coming times, so in the schools
and colleges and universities are grow
ing the mental timber whence the state
shall Gull in the near future those pill
lars and supports which aid to bear up
forever in America civil and religious
liberty-that is, freedom to think, free
dom to speak, freedom to trade, free
dom to develop individualism and to as
sert its consciousness of right without
fear of either partisan or sectarian big
otry. Tree planter and teacher, united in
one, shall be declared the best benefac-
tor of modern times-the chief provider
for posterity.
"On the 10th day of July, 1886, from
the crowded, hurrying streets of London
/ loitered into the solemn aisles of st.
Paul's cathedral. Around on every side
were the statues of England's heroes.
Nelson and Wellington, victors by sea
and land, were there and hundreds more
whose epitaphs were written in blood,
which, as it poured from CHASTITY
wounds, had borne other mortals to the
unknown world. Few men who won dis
tinction in civil life are entombed at St.
Paul's, but among them is the gifted
architect, Sir Christopher Wren, in
whose brain the concept of st. Paul's
cathedral had mental existence before
it materialized in massive marble. His
epitaph is plain, brief, truthful, i'm
pressive. 1t is one which each honorable
man in all the world may strive for and
become the better for the striving; it is
one which every faithful disciple of
horticulture, of forestry will Deserve
Isl qu@ris monumentum, circumspice,
IF you seek my monument, look around
you. D." GEORGE GRANTHAM Balm.