132 THE VAST. 



they elongate, and then grow parallel to the trunk, and 

 at a certain distance from it, so that a cereus with many 

 branches looks exactly like an immense candelabrum, espe- 

 cially as the branches are mostly symmetrically arranged 

 round the trunk, of which the diameter is not usually 

 more than a foot and a half, or, in some rare instances, a 

 foot more. They vary much in height ; the highest we 

 ever saw, at Williams' Fork, measured from thirty-six to 

 forty feet ; but, south of the Gila, they are said to reach 

 sixty ; and when you see them rising from the extreme 

 point of a rock, where a surface of a few inches square 

 forms their sole support, you cannot heljD wondering that 

 the first storm does not tear them from their airy eleva- 

 tion 



" If the smaller specimens of the Cereus giganteus that 

 we had seen in the morning excited our astonishment, the 

 feeling was greatly augmented, when, on our further 

 journey, we beheld this stately plant in all its magnifi- 

 cence. The absence of every other vegetation enabled us 

 to distinguish these cactus-columns from a great distance, 

 as they stood symmetrically arranged on the heights and 

 declivities of the mountains, to which they imparted a 

 most peculiar aspect, though certainly not a beautiful one. 

 Wonderful as each plant is, when regarded singly, as a 

 grand specimen of vegetable life, these solemn, silent 

 forms, which stand motionless, even in a hurricane, give a 

 somewhat dreary character to the landscape. Some look 

 like petrified giants, stretching out their arms in speechless 

 pain, and others stand like lonely sentinels, keeping their 



