128 Rhodora (Jury | 
the tangle. The term Zrummholz (literally “crooked wood ") is usu- 
ally applied to a mountain formation,’ but the characters are so per- 
fectly reproduced in the present instance that the application of the 
term may with profit be extended. The cause for this stunting of 
the trees is probably to be sought in the mechanical and drying 
action of the wind. The prevailing winds at Woods Hole are from 
the southwest; these would exert their full effect on the area in ques- 
tion, for it faces the west and is bounded on the south by a bay 
whose shore owing to wave action is littered with boulders. The 
mechanical action of the wind causes the greater development of 
branches on the east (leeward) side of a tree and the pronounced 
leaning of the trees in that direction; marked examples of this action 
are also to be seen on the neighboring island of Naushon. What 
has been referred to as the drying action of the wind causes a high 
rate of transpiration, ¿4 e, high compared with absorption; this 
results in a general dwarfing of the tree and in the death of some of | 
the branches. It may be urged that a sea-breeze is damp rather 
than dry, and undoubtedly this is the case at times; but ordinarily 
the moving air is less nearly saturated than air which is stationary 
around a transpiring leaf. The action of salt present in the wind 
is certainly not the primary factor, for a krummholz can be formed 
in places far removed from the sea, but the harmful influence of salt 
on most vegetation is so certain that it probably has some influence 
here. It is reported that trees a mile inland on the island of Mar- 
tha’s Vineyard become incrusted with salt during winter storms. 
That the wind is the chief agent in producing the krummholz seems 
exceedingly probable from the mowed-off appearance of the “sur- 
face" of the formation. 
CONCLUSION. 
It has been the writer's attempt in this short account to show that 
the agency of man may accelerate the process called succession. 
The exposed nature of the area under consideration would have 
rendered the progression from a heath to a forest a slow one, but 
through the artificial introduction of conifers and by reason of the 
short life of these trees a second stage in reforestation, v/z., domi- 
1 Schimper, A. F. W., Pflanzengeog. p. 740. 
