a figure of speech involving the comparison of one thing with another thing of a different kind, used to make a description more emphatic or vivid.
since a simile is where you compare 2 things i imagine the similie would be somwhere were he is talking about the maple tree. "before your could say jack robbison they have gone and grown alot bigger than you ever thought they could"
i had some trouble looking for it and thats all that makes sense for the similie i belive.
Ascent means to go up, as in:
<em>The elevator ascended away from me.</em>
I hope this helps!
Explanation:
by reading the questions then go through the passage underlinining the answer