4 Forms of Trees. : [zor 
which during the winter season are void of leaves. In some horti- 
cultural districts, where snow but seldom falls, and where accord- 
ingly such trees as olives, oranges and lemons are cultivated suc- 
cessfully, an occasional fall of snow may do and has in many in- 
stances done considerable harm. We know that when the snow 
lodges on the evergreen and upright limbs of orange trees, these 
limbs become so_ heavy that they break down, more or less ruining 
the trees. On such occasions the growers hurry through their 
orchards shaking off the snow before it begins to melt and become 
heavy, thus freeing the limbs of the trees from the burden that 
would injure them. The cause of the mischief. is thus not alone 
to be found in the snow, but also in the upright shape of the limbs 
and trunks of the trees. Those limbs which point upwards do not 
yield readily under the pressure of the snow, and trunks which 
are repeatedly forked, will, if the pressure is heavy enough, split 
lengthwise. In case the trees in question had possessed downward 
sloping limbs and an upright, undivided or standard trunk, the 
effect of the snow pressure would have been less dangerous; the 
limbs would have yielded to their snow burden, which, when melt- 
ing, would have slipped off, leaving the limbs free, and the undivided 
, trunks would not have split, and the trees would have escaped with- 
out injury. If such snowfalls were frequent and regular, only such 
varieties could be cultivated as were possessed of downward slop- 
ing limbs and upright trunks. All trees shaped otherwise would 
gradually be ruined and their cultivation become impossible. These 
last remarks refer only, or at least principally, to evergreen trees. 
If the orange trees, which we gave as an example, instead of being 
evergreens were deciduous, that is, presenting only bare limbs in 
the winter, like peaches, apricots and pears, the pressure of the 
snow would not have injured them, at least not by breaking their 
limbs and splitting their trunks, and their cultivation would not 
necessarily have been abandoned. If we consider a forest, instead 
of a horticultural district, we will find that the conditions are there 
very much the same. The yearly snowfall, if only heavy enough, 
tends to break down and destroy all wild evergreen trees, which do 
not possess a form suitable to resist the heavy snow mantle. Trees. 
which would thus suffer would be all evergreen trees with spread- 
ing crowns, such as live oaks, laurels, madrofia, certain pines, such 
as Monterey pine, digger pine ( Pinus Sabiniana ), Italian pine (Pinus: 
