leaves
near the ground, and on every log and trunk are myriads of insects,
lizards and little living things of endless varieties, all strange and
wonderful to us.

[Illustration]

In some parts of this interminable forest, where the light breaks
through the foliage, we see suspended from the trees the wonderful
air-plants or orchids. They seem like hanging-baskets of flowers, and
are far more beautiful and luxuriant than anything of the kind that we
have in our hothouses at home.

But we shall not find it easy to walk through all these beauties. As I
said before, we shall often be obliged to cut a path with our
hatchets, and even then we may be unable to penetrate very far into
this jungle of beauties. The natives of these countries, when they are
compelled to pass through these dense forests, often take to the
small streams and wade along in the water, which is sometimes up to
their shoulders, occasionally finding shallower places, or a little
space on the banks where they can pick their way along for a few
hundred yards before they are obliged to take to the stream again.

[Illustration: GIANT TREES OF CALIFORNIA.]

Everything is lovely and luxuriant here, but it will not do to stay
too long. There are fevers and snakes.

Let us now go to the greatest woods in the whole world. I do not mean
the most extensive forest, but that one where the trees are the
grandest. This is the region where the giant trees of California grow.

Nowhere on the face of the earth are there such trees as these. Some
of them stand over four hundred feet high, and are thirty feet in
diameter!

Their age is believed to be about eighteen hundred years. Think of it!
They have been growing there during the whole of the Christian era!

One of them, the very largest of all, has been lying on the ground for
about one hundred and fifty years. When it was standing its diameter
was about forty feet.

Another trunk, which is lying on the ground, has been hollowed out by
fire, and through this great bore or tube a whole company of horsemen
has ridden.

One of these trees was cut down some years ago by a party of men, who,
I think, should have been sent to prison for the deed. It took five
men twenty-five days to cut it through with augers and saws, and then
they were obliged to use a great wedge and a battering-ram to make it
fall.

These are the kings of all trees. After such a grand sight, we will
not want to see any more trees to-day,