"I cannot love evergreens — they are the misanthropes of nature. To them the spring brings no promise, the autumn no decline ; they are cut off from the sweetest of all ties with their kind—sympathy. They have no hopes in common, but stand apart—very emblems for the fortunate and worldly man, whose harsh temper has been unsoftened by participating in general suffering, existing alone in his unshared and sullen prosperity. I will have no evergreens in my garden ; when the inevitable winter comes, every beloved plant and favourite tree shall droop together — no solitary fir left to triumph over the companionship of decay."