trees!

The Indians of different tribes had a way of bending one of the lower
boughs of a young oak chosen for the sacrifice, bending it so that it
grew horizontally, pointing the way along the trail for the initiated.
They would have trees done like that at regular intervals; but if you
were a silly European you wouldn't know without being told what the
trees meant by sticking out their elbows in that significant way; and so
you would stupidly proceed to get yourself lost.

Think what those old trees could tell, if by laying your ear against
their trunks you could understand the murmurous whisper inside, like
secret voices behind a thick closed door! They look extraordinarily
intelligent, thrusting out their long arms and crooking up their elbows,
as I said. It's just as if you asked them, "How do I get to the sea?"
and they, with Indian reticence, answered with a gesture instead of
speech. Some of these arms have grown to such a length and thickness
that they look like the bodies of animals. You can imagine little girls
and boys riding on them, playing they are on horses. Or you can picture
a fair maid and a man sitting side by side on one of those big,
low-growing branches, as if it were a comfortable sofa. It would be a
_lovely_ place to be proposed to on a summer's day!

Does your respect for Long Island begin to grow? I haven't told you yet
a quarter of the things that give it interest.

Our part of the Island, the eastern part, used to be harassed by British
cruisers in the Revolution. Also it is the Captain Kidd part. I suppose
even Monty knows about Captain Kidd? It seems that he used to be Jack's
favourite pirate. When I was at the pirate-loving age I didn't care for
Kidd as much as for others, because he had such respectable beginnings.
Think, a Scotsman from Greenock of all places! And then he became a
pirate not for the fun of flying the black flag like storybook pirates,
or because he was disappointed in love, but because he cannily decided
that he could gain more by turning pirate than by chasing pirates, which
Lord Bellomont, the Governor of New York, had sent him out to do. Worst
of all, when he was caught Kidd put the blame on his crew, and vowed
that they'd forced him into evil courses. Now that we've a house on Long
Island, however, I've taken Captain Kidd to my heart. He belongs more to
the Moores of Kidd's Pines than to us, of course, but I value and vaunt
him as a neighbouring ghost of distinct