it is as if the whole wood were full of friendly voice,
calling you farther in, and you turn from one side to another, like
Buridan's donkey, in a maze of pleasure.
Comely beeches send up their white, straight, clustered branches,
barred with green moss, like so many fingers from a half-clenched
hand. Mighty oaks stand to the ankles in a fine tracery of
underwood; thence the tall shaft climbs upwards, and the great forest
of stalwart boughs spreads out into the golden evening sky, where the
rooks are flying and calling. On the sward of the Bois d'Hyver the
firs stand well asunder with outspread arms, like fencers saluting;
and the air smells of resin all around, and the sound of the axe is
rarely still. But strangest of all, and in appearance oldest of all,
are the dim and wizard upland districts of young wood. The ground is
carpeted with fir-tassel, and strewn with fir-apples and flakes of
fallen bark. Rocks lie crouching in the thicket, guttered with rain,
tufted with lichen, white with years and the rigours of the changeful
seasons. Brown and yellow butterflies are sown and carried away
again by the light air - like thistledown.
Pages:
211
212
213
214
215
216
217
218
219
220
221
222
223
224
225
226
227
228
229
230
231
232
233
234
235