CHAPTER VIII
THE FORESTS
The coniferous forests of the Sierra are the grandest and most beautiful
in the world, and grow in a delightful climate on the most interesting
and accessible of mountain-ranges, yet strange to say they are not well
known. More than sixty years ago David Douglas, an enthusiastic botanist
and tree lover, wandered alone through fine sections of the Sugar Pine
and Silver Fir woods wild with delight. A few years later, other
botanists made short journeys from the coast into the lower woods. Then
came the wonderful multitude of miners into the foot-hill zone, mostly
blind with gold-dust, soon followed by "sheepmen," who, with wool over
their eyes, chased their flocks through all the forest belts from one
end of the range to the other. Then the Yosemite Valley was discovered,
and thousands of admiring tourists passed through sections of the lower
and middle zones on their way to that wonderful park, and gained fine
glimpses of the Sugar Pines and Silver Firs along the edges of dusty
trails and roads. But few indeed, strong and free with eyes undimmed
with care, have gone far enough and lived long enough with the trees to
gain anything like a loving conception of their grandeur and
significance as manifested in the harmonies of their distribution and
varying aspects throughout the seasons, as they stand arrayed in their
winter garb rejoicing in storms, putting forth their fresh leaves in the
spring while steaming with resiny fragrance, receiving the
thunder-showers of summer, or reposing heavy-laden with ripe cones in
the rich sungold of autumn.
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