mmetrical fern-frond. The
staminate cones are seen growing straight downward from the under side
of the young branches in lavish profusion, making fine purple clusters
amid the grayish-green foliage. On the topmost branches the fertile
cones are set firmly on end like small casks. They are about six inches
long, three wide, covered with a fine gray down, and streaked with
crystal balsam that seems to have been poured upon each cone from above.

Both the Silver Firs live 250 years or more when the conditions about
them are at all favorable. Some venerable patriarch may often be seen,
heavily storm-marked, towering in severe majesty above the rising
generation, with a protecting grove of saplings pressing close around
his feet, each dressed with such loving care that not a leaf seems
wanting. Other companies are made up of trees near the prime of life,
exquisitely harmonized to one another in form and gesture, as if Nature
had culled them one by one with nice discrimination from all the rest of
the woods.

[Illustration: VIEW OF FOREST OF THE MAGNIFICENT SILVER FIR.]

It is from this tree, called Red Fir by the lumberman, that mountaineers
always cut boughs to sleep on when they are so fortunate as to be within
its limits. Two rows of the plushy branches overlapping along the
middle, and a crescent of smaller plumes mixed with ferns and flowers
for a pillow, form the very best bed imaginable. The essences of the
pressed leaves seem to fill every pore of one's body, the sounds of
falling water make a soothing hush, while the spaces between the grand
spires afford noble openings through which to gaze dreamily into the
starry sky. Even in the matter of sensuous ease, any combination of
cloth, steel springs, and feathers seems vulgar in comparison.

The fir woods are delightful sauntering-grounds at any time of year, but
most so in autumn. Then the noble trees are hushed in the hazy light,
and drip with balsam; the cones are ripe, and the seeds, with their
ample purple wings, mottle the air like flocks of butterflies; while
deer feeding in the flowery openings between the groves, and birds and
squirrels in the branches, make a pleasant stir which enriches the deep,
brooding calm of the wilderness, and gives a peculiar impressiveness to
every tree. No wonder the enthusiastic Douglas went wild with joy when
he first discovered this species. Even in the Sierra, where so many
noble evergreens challenge admiration, we linger am