scrubs. They are more like the scrubby fir and black spruce on which
you stand, and sometimes walk, on the tops of mountains, where cold
is the demon they contend with, than anything else. No wonder they
are prompted to grow thorns at last, to defend themselves against
such foes. In their thorniness, however, there is no malice, only
some malic acid.

The rocky pastures of the tract I have referred to--for they
maintain their ground best in a rocky field--are thickly sprinkled
with these little tufts, reminding you often of some rigid gray
mosses or lichens, and you see thousands of little trees just
springing up between them, with the seed still attached to them.

Being regularly clipped all around each year by the cows, as a hedge
with shears, they are often of a perfect conical or pyramidal form,
from one to four feet high, and more or less sharp, as if trimmed by
the gardener's art. In the pastures on Nobscot Hill and its spurs
they make fine dark shadows when the sun is low. They are also an
excellent covert from hawks for many small birds that roost and
build in them. Whole flocks perch in them at night, and I have seen
three robins' nests in one which was six feet in diameter.

No doubt many of these are already old trees, if you reckon from the
day they were planted, but infants still when you consider their
development and the long life before them. I counted the annual
rings of some which were just one foot high, and as wide as high,
and found that they were about twelve years old, but quite sound and
thrifty! They were so low that they were unnoticed by the walker,
while many of their contemporaries from the nurseries were already
bearing considerable crops. But what you gain in time is perhaps in