قراءة كتاب Arbor Day Leaves A Complete Programme For Arbor Day Observance, Including Readings, Recitations, Music, and General Information
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Arbor Day Leaves A Complete Programme For Arbor Day Observance, Including Readings, Recitations, Music, and General Information
this that the upper surface is of a deeper green than the lower.
Such, then, is the laboratory of the leaf, the place where certain inorganic, lifeless substances such as water, lime, sulphur, potash, and phosphorus are transformed and converted into living and organic vegetable matter, and from which this is sent forth to build up every part of the tree from deepest root to topmost sprig. It is in the leaves also that all the food of man and all other animals is prepared, for if any do not feed upon vegetable substances directly but upon flesh, that flesh nevertheless has been made only as vegetable food has been eaten to form it. It is, as the Bible says, "The tree of the field is man's life."
But let us consider a little further the work of the leaves. The tree is made up almost wholly of oxygen, hydrogen, and carbon. It is easy to see where the oxygen and hydrogen are obtained, for they are the two elements which compose water, and that, we have seen, the roots are absorbing from the ground all the while and sending through the body of the tree into the leaves. But where does the carbon come from? A little examination will show.
The atmosphere is composed of several gases, mainly of oxygen and nitrogen. Besides these, however, it contains a small portion of carbonic acid, that is, carbon chemically united with oxygen. The carbonic acid is of no use to us directly, and in any but very minute quantities is harmful; but the carbon in it, if it can be separated from the oxygen, is just what the tree and every plant wants. And now the work of separating the carbon from the oxygen is precisely that which is done in the wonderful laboratory of the leaf. Under the magic touch of the sun, the carbonic acid of the atmosphere which has entered the leaf through the breathing pores or stomates and is circulating through the air-passages and cells, is decomposed, that is, taken to pieces; the oxygen is poured out into the air along with the watery vapor of the crude sap, while the carbon is combined with the elements of water and other substances which we have mentioned, to form the elaborated sap or plant-material which is now ready to be carried from the leaves to all parts of the plant or tree, to nourish it and continue its growth. Such is the important and wonderful work of the leaf, the tender, delicate leaf, which we crumple so easily in our fingers. It builds up, atom by atom, the tree and the great forests which beautify the world and provide for us a thousand comforts and conveniences. Our houses and the furniture in them, our boats and ships, the cars in which we fly so swiftly, the many beautiful and useful things which are manufactured from wood of various kinds, all these, by the help of the sun, are furnished us by the tiny leaves of the trees.
BRYANT, THE POET OF TREES.
"It is pleasant," as Mr. George W. Curtis has said, "to remember, on Arbor Day, that Bryant, our oldest American poet and the father of our American literature, is especially the poet of trees. He grew up among the solitary hills of western Massachusetts, where the woods were his nursery and the trees his earliest comrades. The solemnity of the forest breathes through all his verse, and he had always, even in the city, a grave, rustic air, as of a man who heard the babbling brooks and to whom the trees told their secrets."
His "Forest Hymn" is familiar to many, but it cannot be too familiar. It would be well if teachers would encourage their pupils to commit the whole, or portions of it, at least, to memory. Let it be made a reading lesson, but, in making it such, let pains be taken to point out its felicities of expression, its beautiful moral tone and lofty sentiment, and its wise counsels for life and conduct. Nothing could be more appropriate, especially for the indoor portion of the Arbor Day exercises, than to have this poem, or portions of it, read by some pupil in full sympathy with its spirit, or by some class in concert.
FOREST HYMN.
To hew the shaft and lay the architrave
And spread the roof above them, ere he framed
The lofty vault to gather and roll back
The sound of anthems; in the darkling wood,
Amidst the cool and silence, he knelt down
And offered to the Mightiest solemn thanks
And supplications. For his simple heart
Might not resist the sacred influences
Which from the stilly twilight of the place
And from the gray old trunks that high in heaven
Mingled their mossy boughs, and from the sound
Of the invisible breath that swayed at once
All their green tops, stole over him and bowed
His spirit with the thought of boundless power
And inaccessible majesty. Ah, why
Should we, in the world's riper years, neglect
God's ancient sanctuaries and adore
Only among the crowd and under roofs
That our frail hands have raised? Let me, at least,
Here, in the shadow of this ancient wood,
Offer one hymn, thrice happy if it find
Acceptance in His ear.
—Bryant.
JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL.
We can hardly see or think of trees without being reminded of Mr. Lowell, whose death during the last year was so great a loss. He was eminently a lover of trees, and they were the inspiration of some of his best prose and poetry. This love of trees led him to call his pleasant place of residence, in Cambridge, "Elmwood." In making up our selections for reading or recitation on Arbor Day, the writings of no one have been turned to more often, probably, than those of Mr. Lowell, and it will be very proper if we make this year's observance distinguished by the abundance of our extracts from his various works. We may well also plant memorial trees in honor of him. No one is more worthy of such honor, and we can hardly do any better thing than to plant trees which shall bear his name and remind us hereafter of his noble words and noble life. And no memorial of him would be more appropriate or more accordant with his own feelings than a growing tree. This is abundantly shown by the following letter, written only a few years ago, when it was proposed in one of our schools, to plant on Arbor Day, a tree in his memory.
"I can think of no more pleasant way of being remembered than by the planting of a tree. Like whatever things are perennially good, it will be growing while we are sleeping, and will survive us to make others happier. Birds will rest in it and fly thence with messages of good cheer. I should be glad to think that any word or deed of mine could be such a perennial presence of beauty, or show so benign a destiny."
THE OAK.
What gnarled stretch, what depth of shade, is his?
There needs no crown to mark the forest's king;
How in his leaves outshines full summer's bliss!
Sun, storm, rain, dew, to him their tribute bring,