avenged the demolition by making the experimental garden unsafe
to enter;--they always swarm into underbrush and shrubbery after
forest-trees have been clearedd away.... Subsequently the garden
was greatly damaged by storms and torrential rains; the mountain
river overflowed, carrying bridges away and demolishing stone-
work. No attempt was made to repair these destructions; but
neglect alone would not have ruined the lovliness of the place;--
barbarism was necessary! Under the present negro-radical regime
orders have been given for the wanton destruction of trees older
than the colony itself;--and marvels that could not be replaced
in a hundred generations were cut down and converted into
charcoal for the use of public institutions.



XIX.


How gray seem the words of poets in the presence is Nature!...
The enormous silent poem of color and light--(you who know only
the North do not know color, do not know light!)--of sea and sky,
of the woods and the peaks, so far surpasses imagination as to
paralyze it--mocking the language of admiration, defying all
power of expression. That is before you which never can be
painted or chanted, because there is no cunning of art or speech
able to reflect it. Nature realizes your most hopeless ideals of
beauty, even as one gives toys to a child. And the sight of this
supreme terrestrial expression of creative magic numbs thought.
In the great centres of civilization we admire and study only the
results of mind,--the products of human endeavor: here one views