But though the area occupied by the species increases so much from north
to south there is no marked increase in the size of the trees. A height
of 275 feet and a diameter near the ground of about 20 feet is perhaps
about the average size of full-grown trees favorably situated; specimens
25 feet in diameter are not very rare, and a few are nearly 300 feet
high. In the Calaveras Grove there are four trees over 300 feet in
height, the tallest of which by careful measurement is 325 feet. The
largest I have yet met in the course of my explorations is a majestic
old scarred monument in the King's River forest. It is 35 feet 8 inches
in diameter inside the bark four feet from the ground. Under the most
favorable conditions these giants probably live 5000 years or more,
though few of even the larger trees are more than half as old. I never
saw a Big Tree that had died a natural death; barring accidents they
seem to be immortal, being exempt from all the diseases that afflict and
kill other trees. Unless destroyed by man, they live on indefinitely
until burned, smashed by lightning, or cast down by storms, or by the
giving way of the ground on which they stand.
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