THE BIG BANYAN TREE

The Banyan tree is one of those low-trunked, branch kinds. Easy to climb and perch in, it sends down branches that root making it bigger and rather night-marish in appearance. However, the children in this story love the town's biggest Banyan and, well-organized and politically sophisticated, they decide to keep it from falling to the inroads of a super-highway. First they march on their parents and then on the city fathers to no avail. Then they tree-in and refuse to get out of the branches for the highway crew. Taking a lesson from the children, the mothers move in so that the children can go to school. When a storm almost levels the town, only the tree is undamaged, and the highway is re-routed. An over-complicated fish story about a tree in simple words. The nonsense aspect comes off better in the swiftly sketched illustrations than in the text.