Or childhood’s tale is told;
Or lips move tunefully along
Some glorious page of old.
Here is a picture of Love, Music, and Salad in perfect combination. And what a secret lies behind it! The fact is that the heathen world has nothing at all corresponding to our English sweethearting. [225] Men and women are thrown into each other’s arms by barter, by compact, by conquest, and in a thousand ways. In one land a man buys his bride; in another he fights as the brutes do for the mate of his fancy; in yet another he takes her without seeing her, it was so ordained. Only in a land that has felt the spell of the influence of Jesus would sweethearting, as we know it, be possible. The pure and charming freedom of social intercourse; the liberty to yield to the mystic magnetism that draws the one to the other, and the other to the one; the coy approach; the shy exchanges; the arm-in-arm walks, and the heart-to-heart talks; the growing admiration; the deepening passion; culminating at last in the fond formality of the engagement and the rapture of ultimate union; in what land, unsweetened by the power of the gospel, would such a procedure be possible? And the consequence is that our homes stand in such striking contrast to the homes of heathen peoples. ‘There are no homes in Asia!’ Mr. W. H. Seward, the American statesman, exclaimed sadly, fifty years ago. It is scarcely true now, for Christ is gaining on Asia every day; and the missionaries confess that the greatest propagating power that the gospel possesses is the gracious though silent witness of the Christian homes. Human life is robbed of all animalism and baseness when true [226] love enters. And there is no true love apart from the highest love of all.
Salad may seem a prosaic thing to follow on the heels of Love and Music; but the salad that has been prepared by fingers that one thinks it heaven to kiss is tinged and tinctured with the flavour of romance. All through life, Love makes life’s Music. All through life, Love and Music lead to Salad. And, all through life, Love and Music glorify the Salad to which they lead. They transmute it by this magic into such a dish as many a king has sighed for all his days, but sighed in vain.
[227]
III
THE FELLING OF THE TREE
I was strolling with some friends up a lovely avenue in the bush this afternoon, when a quite unexpected experience befell us. On either side of the narrow track the tall trees jostled each other at such close quarters that, when we looked up, only a ribbon of sky could be seen above our heads. The tree-tops almost arched over us. Straight before us was a hill surmounted by a number of gigantic blue-gums, only one or two of which were visible in the limited section of the landscape which the foliage about us permitted us to survey. As we sauntered leisurely along the leafy path, thinking of anything but the objects immediately surrounding us, we were suddenly startled by a loud and ominous creaking and straining. Looking hastily up, we saw one of the giant trees falling, and describing in its fall an enormous arc against the clear sky ahead of us. What a crash as the toppling monster strikes the tree-tops among which it falls! What a thud as the huge thing hits the ground! What a roar as it rolls over the hill, bearing down all lesser growths before it! Our first impression was that the tree had [228] been reduced by natural forces; but we soon discovered that it had been deliberately destroyed! The men were already at work upon a second magnificent fellow; and we waited until he too was prostrate.
Nothing in the solar system suggests such a mixture of emotion as the felling of a great tree. In a way, it is pleasant and exhilarating, or why was Mr. Gladstone so fond of the exercise? And why were we so eager to stay until the second tree was down? Richard Jefferies, who hated to destroy things, and often could not bring himself to pull the trigger of his gun, nevertheless felt the fascination of the axe. ‘Much as I admired the timber about the Chace,’ he says, ‘I could not help sometimes wishing to have a chop at it. The pleasure of felling trees is never lost. In youth, in manhood, so long as the arm can wield the axe, the enjoyment is equally keen. As the heavy tool passes over the shoulder, the impetus of the swinging motion lightens the weight, and something like a thrill passes through the sinews. Why is it so pleasant to strike? What secret instinct is it that makes the delivery of a blow with axe or hammer so exhilarating?’ What indeed! For certainly a wild delight makes the heart beat faster, and sends the blood bounding through the veins, as one sees the axes flash, the chips fly, the gash grow deeper, and [229] notices at last the first slow movement of the glorious tree.
And yet I confess that, mixed with this pungent sense of pleasure, there was a still deeper emotion. The thing seems so irreparable. It is easy enough to destroy these monarchs of the bush, but who can restore them to their former grandeur? It must have been this sense of sadness that led Beaconsfield—Gladstone’s famous protagonist—to ordain in his will that none of his beloved trees at Hughenden should ever be cut down. How long had these trees stood here, these two giants that had been in a few moments reduced to humiliating horizontality? I cannot tell. They must have been here when all these hills and valleys were peopled only by the aboriginals. They saw the black man prowl about the bush. From the hill here, overlooking the bay, they must have seen Captain Cook’s ships cast anchor down the stream. They watched the coming of the white men; they saw the convict ships arrive with their dismal freight of human wretchedness; they witnessed the swift and tragic extermination of the native race; they beheld a nation spring into being at their feet! Did the great trees know that, as the white men exterminated the black men, so the white men would exterminate them? Did they feel that the coming of those strange vessels up the bay sealed [230] their own doom? Before the new-comers could build their homes, or lay out their farms, or plant their orchards, they must make war on the trees with fire and axe. Homes and nations can only be built by sacrifice, and the trees are the innocent victims.