ss BOTANICAL GAZETTE. 



and (U'liglitful ])rnmona(le nia\' bo pnjoyed. Marble slabs imbedded in the soft l)ark, 

 hiii'h up oil eacli tree, bear its name and iijciieral]}- the initials of the namer. Near the 

 road, almost the lirst to oreet.tlie visitor approaching from the north, stands a group of 

 noble trees bearing the names of Henry W. Longfellow, Prof. Jolm Dana, Dr. John 

 Torrey and Prof. Asa Gray. During this lirst half-day of silent gazing, I found my.sc!f 

 frc(pieutly returning.to this group of seientists with a sublime poet added, and trying 

 to commune with the master spirits tliey commemorate. During my last call a cone 

 from the lyfty crown of "Prof. Asa Gray" fell at my feet; eagerly I seized it and 

 wrapped it in paper; another and another followed. The squirrels were harvesting, so 

 the seed must be ripe. I drew my army revolver and fired a" round of six cartridges up 

 into the crown, rewarded by the fall of a limb bearing a dozen cones. As I bore away 

 the beautiful little cones with their tiny, parsnip-like seeds, I thought how much tiiis 

 precious fruit symbolizes those richer fruits which that other Professor Gray showers 

 upon all who but ask his bounty. Hard at work in the great herbarium at the Cam- 

 bridge University, he is devoting, perhaps, the last herculean energies of a life tilleil 

 with toil to the completion of our California Botany. Kecciving no salary while on 

 this extra work, and hiring assistants in sjiecial fields, he toils almost incessantly, ever 

 the master mind to direct research, ever'the umpire to decide knotty points, yet ever the 

 kind patron, ready to turn aside, examine the i)l;ints of the young collector and help 

 the humblest applicant for knowledge. 



Then the good doctor's tenacity for truth is so strong 1 No big stories for him, no 

 flights of fancy, no careless writing! I think of this with bated breadth, compressetl 

 lips, clenched hands and firm tread as I prepare tor work in earnest on the morrow. 



The stump of the very large tree which was bored off with pump augers in 1852 to 

 form the floor of a house, affords a fine opportunity for counting, since it is so evenly 

 smoothed off, but still more time is necessary to do it accurately than most observers 

 allow themselves. This tree should certainly be considered a fair sample of the oldest 

 of the present generation, for it is one of tlie largest ever seen. Its circuit at base is 'J7 

 feet by my tape line, held at one end by a Puritan and master builder from Boston. 

 Longest diameter without bark, five feet above the base, 34 feet 10 inches. Shortest di- 

 ameter, 22 feet eight inches. The bark averages 18 inches in thickness, making the en- 

 tire longest diameter of the tree at five feet above base, over 27 feet. A few other trees 

 are met with measuring as much or more at base, butthey are generally swollen outward 

 and hollow like the shaft of a light house. This monster tree was as straight and sound 

 as a candle, hence it was undoubtedly the largest perfect tree ever j'et .seen. 



I spent nearly a day counting the rings of this stump, and of the butt cut of the 

 tree lying near it. I counted carefully both ways, putting in pins to mark the ])lace of 

 hundreds. The stump being a little irregular in consequence of its near roots, I counted 

 in three places along three equidistant rays. The first count was 1,260 rings, the second 

 count was l,2o8 rings and the third count was 1,261 rings — average age, 1,260 years. 

 Counting on the butt, cut 24 feet from the base, the rings were of course a few- less, 1,242 

 in number, but all veiT plainly discernible, and presenting exact uniformity in their 

 decrease in thickness, from heart to bark. I availed of this uniformity of decrease by 

 establishing, after many counts of different trees, a rule for determining the mean num- 

 ber of rings to tlie linear foot, and fixing the locality on a cut across these trees where 

 the rings are of average thicknes.s. That point is just one third of the distance from 

 the bark to the heart. At the heart the grains are often three-eighths of an inch thick, at 

 the bark as thin as paper. The average, as determined by countings of all the logs in 

 the grove which have been cut across, some half dozen or more, ck^irly established the 

 rule that the rings of average width are found one-third of the way from the bark to the 

 heart. This rule jiroved very useful afterward in estimating age of broken trunks. 



Hercules. — This monster tree was leveled to the earth by a gale in 1862. His body 

 has been repeatedly cut across by an ingenious device, and the timber manufactured 

 into relics and carried away. He was 28.j feet high, and no-w measures 14 feet in diam- 

 eter 2J) feet from his roots. A careful count of his i-ings showed only 1,282 years. 

 Eighty -eight of these rings, the average number to the half foot, just covered the 'space 

 of half a foot at the distance of two and one-third feet from the bark, which is one-third 

 the way to the heart, as seen above. This tree is often reported as over :!,()00 year> old; 



{To be coiiliiniid.) 



