Two final comments on the Linden/Pear fiasco

Received a kindly note from a North Carolinian, Charlotte Reyolds, that made me feel better about my Pear/Linden mistake::

I have a stately tree with heart shaped leaves prominent in the front yard of my farm property in the NC mountains. I always believed it to be a Bradford callery pear, and longed to see the pear’s spectacular white springtime bloom and also its stunning fall orangey red show. I was sure it was a pear, and it looked just like the pears that lined my (and many other) NYC street. However I immediately moved to California and visited the NC farm only during summer and over Christmas / New Year’s.

Then I stayed on in NC for a whole year. No bloom ! I was shocked. No orange show that fall! I was crestfallen. I asked around. Finally the tree was identified as a linden.

Finally, Jack Meyer writes:

I've been following the tree detection with interest. After your first post I tried reading the line in the poem with "Lindens" substituted for "sycamores" and while it didn't have the same rythym as "sycamores" it didn't jar, either .

But "London Planes" just doesn't work. Perhaps White knew the difference, but was taking poetic license. And he would have had to re-write the whole thing had he done it after the trees were replaced with Bradford Callery Pears . That one would never have worked.