To a native of New England, therefore, the Elm has a value more nearly approaching that of sacredness than any other tree.  Setting aside the pleasure derived from it as an object of visual beauty, it is intimately associated with the familiar scenes of home and the events of his early life.  In my own mind it is pleasingly allied with those old dwelling-houses which were built in the early part of the last century, and form one of the marked features of New England home architecture during that period.  They are known by their broad and ample, but low-studded rooms, their numerous windows with small panes, their single chimney in the centre of the roof that sloped down to the lower story in the back part, and in their general unpretending appearance, reminding one vividly of that simplicity of life which characterized our people before the Revolution.  Their very homeliness is delightful, by leaving the imagination free to dwell upon their pleasing suggestions.  Not many of these charming old houses are now extant:  but whenever we see one, we are almost sure to find it accompanied by its Elm, standing upon the green open space that slopes up to it in front, and waving its long branches in melancholy grandeur over the venerable habitation which it seems to have taken under its protection, while it droops with sorrow over the infirmities of its old companion of a century.

The Elm is remarkable for the variety of forms which it assumes in different situations.  Often it has a drooping spray only when it has attained a large size; but it almost invariably becomes subdivided into several equal branches, diverging from a common centre, at a considerable elevation from the ground.  One of these forms is that of a vase:  the base being represented by the roots of the tree that project above the soil and join the trunk,—­the middle by the lower part of the principal branches, as they swell out with a graceful curve, then gradually diverge, until they bend downward and form the lip of the vase, by their circle of terminal branches.  Another of its forms is that of a vast dome, as represented by those trees that send up a single shaft to the height of twenty feet or more, and then extend their branches at a wide divergency and to a great length.  The Elms which are remarkable for their drooping character are usually of this shape.  At other times the Elm assumes the shape of a plume, presenting a singularly fantastical appearance.  It rises upwards, with an undivided shaft, to the height of fifty feet or more, without a limb, and bending over with a gradual curve from about the middle of its height to its summit, which is sometimes divided into two or three terminal branches.  The whole is covered from its roots to its summit with a fringe of vine-like twigs, extremely slender, twisted and irregular, and resembling a parasitic growth.  Sometimes it is subdivided at the usual height into three or four long branches, which are wreathed In the same manner, and form a compound plume.