shot up regularly with glossy tattooed bark, whence scaly fragments
fell. Down a gentle slope descended the larches, resembling a band of
barbarians, draped in _sayons_ of woven greenery. But the oaks were
the monarchs of all--the mighty oaks, whose sturdy trunks thrust out
conquering arms that barred the sun's approach from all around them;
Titan-like trees, oft lightning-struck, thrown back in postures like
those of unconquered wrestlers, with scattered limbs that alone gave
birth to a whole forest.

Could the tree which Serge and Albine sought be one of those colossal
oaks? or was it one of those lovely planes, or one of those pale,
maidenly birches, or one of those creaking elms? Albine and Serge still
plodded on, unable to tell, completely lost amongst the crowding trees.
For a moment they thought they had found the object of their quest in
the midst of a group of walnut trees from whose thick foliage fell
so cold a shadow that they shivered beneath it. Further on they felt
another thrill of emotion as they came upon a little wood of chestnut
trees, green with moss and thrusting out big strange-shaped branches, on
which one might have built an aerial village. But further still Albine
caught sight of a clearing, whither they both ran hastily. Here, in the
midst of a carpet of fine turf, a locust tree had set a very toppling of
greenery, a foliaged Babel, whose ruins were covered with the strangest
vegetation. Stones, sucked up from the ground by the mounting sap, still
remained adhering to the trunk. High branches bent down to earth again,
and, taking root, surrounded the parent tree with lofty arches, a nation
of new trunks which ever increased and multiplied. Upon the bark, seared
with bleeding wounds, were ripening fruit-pods; the mere effort of
bearing fruit strained the old monster's skin until it split. The young
folks walked slowly round it, passing under the arched branches which
formed as it were the streets of a city, and stared at the gaping cracks
of the naked roots. Then they went off, for they had not felt there the
supernatural happiness they sought.

'Where are we?' asked Serge.

Albine did not know. She had never before come to this part of the park.
They were now in a grove of cytisus and acacias, from whose clustering
blossoms fell a soft, almost sugary perfume. 'We are quite lost,' she
laughed. 'I don't know these trees at all.'

'But the garden must come to an end somewhere,' said Serge. 'W