The Leavenworth echo. [volume] (Leavenworth, Wash.) 1904-current, 1907-02-01
A Tribute To Grass

sns, should be preserved:
Majestic, fruitful, wondrous plant
The corn triumphant, that with the aid
Of man hath made victorious procession
across the tufted plain and laid founda-
ton for the social excellence that is
and is to be. This glorious plant,
transmitted by the alchemy of God,
sustains the warrior in battle, the poet
in song and strengthens everywhere
the thousand arms that work the pur-
poses Of life.
Next in importance to the divine
profusion Of water, light and air, those
three great physical facts which render
existence possible, may be reckoned
the universal benefcence Of grass. Ex-
aggerated by tropical heats and vapors
to the gigantic cane congested with Its
saccharine secretion or dwarfed by po-
lar rigors to the fibrous hair OF northern
solitudes, embracing between these ex-
tremes the maize, with its resolute pen
mons, the rice plant in the southern
swamps, the wheat, rye, barley, oats
other cereals, no less than the humber
verdue of the hillside, pasture and
prairie in the temperate zone, grass is
the most widely distributed Of all vege-
table beings and is at once the type OF
our life and the emblem Of mortality.
Lying in the sunshine among the but
tercups and dandelions of May, scarce
ly higher in intelligence than the mi
mute tenants Of the mimic wilderness,
our earliest recollections are OF grass,
and when the ftful fever is ended and
the foolish wrangle Of the market and
the forum is closed grass heals over the
scar which our descent into the bosom
of the earth has made, and the carpet
of the infant becomes the blanket OF
the dead.
Grass is the forgiveness OF nature,
her constant benediction. Fields tram
pied with battle, saturated with blood,
torn with the ruts of canon, grow green
again with grass, and carnage is forgot
ten. Streets abandoned by traffic be-
come grass grown like rural lanes and
obliterated. Forests decay, harvests
perish, flowers vanish, but grass is i'm
mortal. Beleaguered by the sullen
hosts of winter, it withdraws into the
impregnable fortress Of its subteranean
vitality and energies upon the first So
licitation Of spring. Sown by the
winds, by wandering birds, propagated
by the subtle horticulture Of the ele-
ments, which are its ministers and ser
wants, it softens the rude outline Of the
world. Its tenacious fibers hold the
earth in its place and prevent its solu-
BILE components from washing into the
wasting sea. 1t invades the solitudes
of deserts, climbs inaccessible slopes
and forbidding pinnacles OF mountains,
modifies climates and determines the
history, character and destiny OF the
nations. Unobtrusive and patient, ii
has immortal vigor and aggression.
Banished from the thoroughfare and
the field, it bides its time to return,
and when vigilance is relaxed or the
dynasty has persisted it silently resumes
the throne from which it has been ex-
PEELED, but which it never abrogates.
1t bears no blazonry Of bloom to charm
the senses with fragrance or splendor,
but its homely hue is more enchanting
than the lily or the rose. 1t yields nc
fruit in earth or air, and yet should its
harvest fail for single year famine
would depopulate the world"