i82 IP s t e I s i a 



high, with scarcely tapering trunks two or three 

 meters in diameter at the base. The bark of this 

 tree, at first smooth and thin, becomes in old 

 specimens, three decimeters thick and very 

 deeply fissured, falling off in scales which often 

 collect at the base of a large tree in a mound a 

 meter or more high. The foliage has the gen- 

 eral appearance of that of a spruce, but the 

 spray is more often somewhat flattened, and is 

 much softer to the touch than that of the spruces. 

 Tlie leaves arc short-j)etiolcd and flattened and, 

 unlike the spruces and hemlocks, are persistent 

 in drying. They are inserted on woody mounds 

 of elliptical outline, which vary considerably in 

 prominence in different si)ecimens, so that some- 

 times a twig from which the leaves are removed 

 is as rough as in Tsuga, and sometimes as smooth 

 as in Abies. The cones of the Douglas fir are 

 very characteristic, like spruce cones in their 

 general appearance, but more woody and mark- 

 ed by the very long, exserted, three-pointed 

 bracts. The cones fall from the trees soon after 

 they have discharged their seeds. 



The Douglas fir is very abundant in Van- 



