THE FORESTS OF THE SIERRA NEVADA.

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crown of foliage and its immense cones, forms a handsome contrast to the second, its twin-brother in size, but with light reddish-yellow bark lying in great scales or plates, and with a foliage very like that of our own Scotch fir.' If the pines exceed in bulk and massiveness, the red spruces have a stately grace of their own quite unsurpassed. Shooting up, many of them, to a height of over 200 feet, with their arrowy stems, and their pyramids of foliage tapering in perfect symmetry to the slender topmost twigs, they seem as if the idea of a cathedral spire had been copied from them, and one almost thinks that the architect of the Duomo of Milan must have taken his model from a group of them. Of these pines and spruces every full-grown tree is a perfect picture of strength and beauty; for every trunk grows straight and round, every leafy crown looks fresh and vigorous, and no tree leans or crowds against its neighbour. On every side there is a dense array of stately stems, as if nature had here raised to herself a temple of a myriad columns; but between each column there is an ample flooring. Nor do these royal trees suffer any parasites to grow up around their feet, and so hide their beauty or impair their strength. No creepers twine round their sturdy forms, or hang from their lofty boughs; their trunks are bare of branches up to the height of sixty, seventy, and even a hundred feet; the ground below them is for the most part bare and brown, seamed here and there with their own knotted and sinuous roots, or scantily covered with low-growing plants of the wortleberry or bilberry kind.

But at a lower altitude, where these forests just begin to show their full growth, and in the sheltered gullies amongst them higher up, other trees, of a kindred nature to the pines and firs, grow with them in great luxuriance. Next in size to the sugar pine (Pinus Lambetiana), the yellow

pine (Pinus ponderosa), and the red spruce (Abies Douglasii), comes the Arbor vitae (Thuja gigantea), known also in California as the red cedar-a handsome tree with gracefully-drooping foliage, and a ruddy bark full of deep seams and projecting ridges, growing occasionally to a height of 200 feet. Then there is the balsam-fir (Picea grandis), the young specimens of which, with their horizontal branches, and their trunks dotted with transparent drops of sweet-smelling resin, are especially beautiful.

The yellow-fir and the white cedar also find here a genial soil; but the further we leave behind the lower limit of the pine forests, the fewer do the different species become, and the more gigantic are the individual trees.

We pass over the summit of the ridge, and while the last rays of the setting sun are making ruddier the ruddy trunks around us, descend rapidly to Clark's Ranch,' our resting-place for the night. The evening air cools rapidly, and the change of temperature from mid-day to midnight in these high valleys is very great. At a height of 5,000 ft. above the sea there are frosts in every month of the year, and in this month of July a frosty night will sometimes be succeeded by a day in which the thermometer will mark over 90° in the shade.

'Clark's Ranch' is only six miles from the Mariposa Grove,' one of the best groves of the Big Trees' of California. An early up-hill ride at a walking pace takes us to the sequestered habitat of these wonders of the vegetable kingdom. Throughout the ride we are surrounded by such trees as those amongst which we passed yesterday, and again we admire their vigour, size, and grace. One sugar-pine is pointed out to us as having been found, by careful measurement, to be 255 ft. in height, and his trunk at the spring' is 9 ft. in diameter; yet he is only a trifle larger, apparently, than dozens of others withir

half a mile of him.

THE MARIPOSA GROVE.

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But we tacitly reserve our admiration

till we reach the real Big Trees.'

Down in a quiet glade, 6,000 ft. up the slopes of the Sierra, grow the monarchs of the world's forests. Half hidden by the huge pines and firs which stand around and among them, and with their tops projecting apparently but little above their tall neighbours, they can scarcely be seen till one is very near them. Then appear, among the darker trunks of pine and spruce, stately stems of a rich cinnamon colour; and the traveller, pushing through the undergrowth of brake, stands in full sight of them. Probably, at first sight, they disappoint those who have read the measurements given of their great trunks; for it is with these trees as with those great buildings whose enormous size has not outrun their symmetry. It is only by looking at them for some time, and comparing them with surrounding objects, that one can appreciate their superb dimensions.

Round these Sequoias grow sugar-pines and Douglas spruces, which would themselves be giants in any European forest; yet they are but dwarfs here, in bulk at least, compared to their enormous neighbours. There is one grand old tree, prostrate on the ground, and fitly named The Fallen Monarch,' up whose trunk you may climb with difficulty, and then look down 20 ft. or more to the ground. There is another, standing in full vigour, though with gnarled and ragged branches which tell of many centuries having passed over his head; we measure his girth at a height of 10 ft. from the ground, and find it 66 ft. At a height of 90 ft. from the ground he throws out his lowest branch; it measures 6 ft. in diameter. He is named 'the Grizzly Giant.' A short distance away is perhaps the most beautiful tree in the whole grove-the Mother of the Forest.' She is not

quite of such great girth as the Giant, but her stem is all untouched by the forest-fires which have left black marks on most of the other veterans, and her bright cinnamon bark undulates into vertical ribs which run up distinctly for 70 ft. or more from the ground. Then there are dozens of others, excelling in size and beauty, yet which attain not unto the first three.' We encamp for lunch in the middle of a group of the largest, and call them 'David's Mighty Men;' and as we look round we can count a score of them, scarcely one of which has a girth of less than 40 ft. at the 'spring.' We ride past many others equally large, and hardly know which to admire the most. Three very

beautiful trees, evidently in their prime, stand close together, and are styled 'The Three Graces;' two others, apparently twin-brothers, but now aged, and with their almost leafless heads leaning towards each other, are 'The Brothers Cheeryble,' and so on. On one some neglected Indian camp-fire has seized; for he lies prostrate, a great black cylinder, his heart burnt out; and so great has his heart been that we ride through the empty tunnel, our heads slightly bent, at a part of his trunk which, when erect, has stood more than 90 ft. from the ground.

There are altogether in this grove alone between 300 and 400 trees of various sizes and ages. The young trees, however, seem remarkably few in proportion to their elder brethren, as if this race of giants belonged rather to past centuries.

There are many other groves of Sequoias in other parts of the western slope of the Sierra Nevada; all are at about the same height-between 5,000 and 6,000 ft. above the sea-nor is this by any means the most extensive grove. Larger trees are mentioned, too, as existing in other groves; a diameter of 40 ft. is even given for one tree in the Tulare Country, but this measurement seems to be

taken at the ground, where, from the swelling of the roots, a much greater diameter is attained than at the 'spring.' Compared with the pines and firs around them, the height of the Sequoias is by no means as extraordinary as their girth. The reason seems partly to be that their wood is of a rather soft and brittle nature, so that when their tops rise above the surrounding trees they are constantly broken off by bleak winds or heavy snows. A pine tree on the Sierra Nevada, with a girth of 18 ft., will often attain a height of 220 ft.; but a Sequoia, with a girth thrice as great, seldom rises higher than 250 ft. The tallest tree in this Mariposa Grove measures 275 ft.-only 20 ft. higher than some of the neighbouring sugar-pines-and the tallest measured tree in any of the other groves is 330 ft. in height. But when we know that even 275 ft. is equal to twice the height of the Duke of York's Column, or 50 ft. higher than the west towers of Westminster Abbey, and that 330 ft. is only 10 ft. lower than the Victoria Tower of the New Houses of Parliament, we may cease to be surprised that these giants are not taller.

And if any traveller is disappointed, at first sight, at their apparent dimensions, he should find ample compensation in their great beauty, which seems, in descriptions of the trees, to have been almost overlooked in comparison with their size. The graceful outline of their towering stems, the velvety softness and rich colour of their bark; their gnarled and knotted boughs, spreading out like the brawny arms of some great Briareus; the rich, bright, green of their elegant, though often scanty foliage, all combine to render them as beautiful as they are tall, as stately as they are sturdy. In the days when high groves' were chosen as natural temples, and among nations who looked on old and great trees as the peculiar