"TONGUES IN TREES."

Dominion, Volume 2, Issue 575, 2 August 1909, Page 6

"TONGUES IN TREES."

THE WEEPING WILLOW. WHAT IT-HEARD IN. BABYLON. ■"•■ , (Bγ "X,") ..■■,'. It is a paradox, of which nature and man are joint authors, that the season which our forefathers, called "jocund spring" is most conspicuously heralded in many a-Now Zealand landscapo by one- of the most sorrowful of trees. Nono of those, which our fathers brought from ovorsca put on their new garments earlier than tho weeping willow.. Already, while it is still winter, anyone, who walks on the suburban footpaths of Wellington may see oil the pendant twigs a few small just-opened leaves. 'They.are ,very few and small as yet. They merely, whisper of tho spring, that is to bo—these tonguee in trees. But always to. the .thoughtful mind their murmur of hope is mingled with regret, and even while they promise, they lament This is not merely because of tbo name , weeping" willow. There is. littlo, in .that; it is too trite and common to be suggestive. The.namo of "weeping nsli" breathes no melancholy. It has almost'festive associations—trim lawns, and garden parties. Let tho Latm for once explain what the English cannot. "Salix babylonica"—the' willow of Babylon. .Murmur that to the newlyopened leaves, and they seem to whispor back, as .if recalling something overheard iu a long past. , .existence, .-;.'. "By the rivers of Babylon'there we sat-down, yea we wept when we remembered Zion. \Ve hanged onr harps upon the willows in the midst thereof," • ' '-. ■

The weeping willow has always been the exiles tree. It has drooped in St. Helena over the. grave of the greatest exile in modern history. They say that air the weeping willows in New Zealand are descendants of the tree.that'hung its green-pennons over tho little dust that was Napoleon. . Under our southern; skies,, it'is in the soft meadows of Hawkes Bay and beside the Avon at-Christ-church; that these.scions harmonise most with the spirit of the scene. - Those are the most toglish portions of New Zealand, the places which bear the plainest marks of the longing of their pioneers for.the Old Land which, though forever out of sight, could never bo put of mmd. Perhaps, even from the lips of men strong to build and plant, wise in council and.resolute to enjoy,. the willows of Avon have heard what the willows. of Euphrates heard so many'centuries before—-

If I.forget thee, 0 Jerusalem, let my; right . ■ hand forget her' cunning. . ■■■■■■■■ If I do not remember, .thee, let mytongue T , -weave to the roof of my.mouth;. It I prefer not Jerusalem' above my chief joy."

Someone ■ may : remark here that since sake babylonica" was named, the learned, being afflicted, with second thoughts, have' announced.that the ; tree on which the Hebrew .exiles hung .their harps may have been, not a willow at all, 'but the nearly retokd .''populus euphratica," the poplar of the Euphrates. .It were to be-wished that they would allow, us the. alternative of the Lbmbardy poplar,..whioh is; really, an exile or ;a colonist iu Lombardy,' as it is here; and :oomes originally from the same part of the world as , the weeping willow and "populus euphratica." \ Besides its, •• upward-pointing' branches, if. cut off at proper lengths/ would make such .perfect 'pegs, for .harps—or hats 1 And flourishing,, as. it. does, .among' the.willows in.New. Zealand, it might.serve to carry the. same associations.. .But ;after- all .it will never do to allow acienoo'to-dicrtite,,to' sentiment; It-is enough that 'the weeping willow has.niingkd w.ith the:tender homesick longings of generations of, men,in all quarters-of-tho_ globo. : The- conclusions, and still more, as m this. case, tlhe doubte of' science, cannot alter that. Since- the united efforts <of Coper■nicus,, Galileo, and r Mr. . Clement Wragge have not availed to break us of tho habit of saying that the sun. rises' and sets, there is ■no cause to fear 'that Hastings' Dictionary of the Bible can tob "salix" babylonica" of any tithe of its; heritage , .of associations':'-": , . ,1 ' So, too, it will not matter very 'much" ; if the kgendof 'the descent of New'-'Zealaiha' willows from that one in St.' tbo given'up. "Encyclopaedia Britanriica"" •■ mentions dubiously that ■manyi weepingi wil,lows in gardens are. : said propagated .as; cuttings from the tree; that overhangs Napoleon's grave. The reference, is, of.cottrse, .to English .gardens. It-deepens vaa tinge of the story that when some .-sailing shin, bound for New Zealand,called,at St.. Helena,.a. -French or English' emigrant brought away .certain ! green twiga for remembrance;" .■ ..-. •.-.. -,,'■ ./.

■ But while the weeping willow is the most' plaintive, all its tribe, are sad. Jn those two stanzas in which Spenser,; irruch like a poetical auctioneer, catalogues' the 'trees of a certain'faerie grove, he mentions "the willow, worn of forlorn paramoures." Members of the Wellington 'Shakespeare Club will cap this at once with the talc of Ophelia's melodious death, beginning,. "There is a willow grows' aslant, a .brook;" •'■■• ■>' -! r ■ ■ '■ And yet sadness is not the willow's only meaning. "Nothing in'nature, least of all a tree, can be'altogether mournful. Even of the-yew, the warden of buried, bones, Tennyson could observe that once a year its gloom is kindled .at-the-tips, though it'passes into gloom again; Spenser, in his arboreal catalogue, found place for- "the cypress funefall," but when he came* to'tie "eugh" (his delightful,'spellingl) he thought of Old England's battle-winhmg archers, and, forgetting tombs and churchyards,, described it only as : "obedient to the/bender's-wi11. ,. His -authoritative example may., suffice for the dictum that even the .uses of trees are poetical. Hence there is nothing incongruous in the , .'supposition..that' the New' Zealand pioneers, who heard among their willows the age-old sighing, "sunt lacrimao. rerum," had planted, them as. the -readiest producers ,of shade and shelter. Any live stick of willow, thrust into'- the ground, will very Boon, become-a, tree. A branch, thrown down and left to' lie in. a moist place, will, send new shoots upwards and' rootlets downwards. Cut off.a. young willow at the .ground, arid up-will'start a.mnltitude of, osiers.for the basketmaker. ' A few weeks hence, the willows all over New Zealand, giving freely. of...their . mere; overplus -of riches, will be. surrounded by the music of millions of,bees.- '■' .. ..' •' .'.'••

_A. tree of, this " abundant and insistent vitality must signify something more than helpless longing, : and indeed the yearly blazonry of hope is nowhere clearer than on the banners hung but go early and so eagerly by the weeping willow:. Perhaps it should be called no longer the exile's tree, but the colonist's tree! The- songs of Zion could not be sung beside the Euphrates, but' the songs of England and of Maoriland are sung beside the Avon, and when the "super flumihd' , is ohanted, there is no echo for its imprecations, but whether the Mother Country or the daughter is most in- , mind, a new and better meaning breathes along 'the words, "Happy shall he be that rewardeth theo as thou hast served us."