6 PINES 



moment taken advantage of, you can fill a cart with 

 them. 



Some, on the other hand, are easily obtained. In 

 the case of the trees that produce cones of the 

 asymmetrical and persistent type, the difficulties of 

 the collector diminish. Where the tree is, there also 

 are the cones, generally as plentiful on the stems as 

 blackberries — when they live up to their reputation — 

 in October. 



Other types with other habits, the Nut Pines and 

 the Albicaulis perhaps in particular, have devastating 

 enemies to contend with, and are only obtained with 

 greatest difficulty upon this side of the water, and 

 then only after having been conveyed overseas 

 from the limited supply on the other side. 



Children from village schools — and at times other 

 bipeds of more adult experience — squirrels in England, 

 chipmunks in America, all these, for various reasons, 

 upon various trees wage a predatory warfare, and 

 against their fruit production. With the represen- 

 tatives of the higher creation, it is the rare sight of, 

 say, a Coulteri cone in all its monstrous proportions 

 that prompts the appropriating impulse. With the 

 representatives of the lower creation, it is the dainty 

 delights of the edible inside that attract their greed. 

 We will not compare further the strength of the 

 temptations that assail, or the motives that move 

 these two classes of voracious sinners against the 

 statute-made laws that define the difference between 

 meum and tuum (mine and yours). The writer 

 knows of many a whacking specimen of Coulteri cone 

 that adorns the mantelpieces of homes located in the 

 environment of their production. Of the Sabiniana 

 and Ayacahuite doubtless the same story could be 

 told. The Lambertiana, or Sugar Pine, is another 

 which produces giant specimens, but it seldom cones 

 in England, and when it does, hardly comes up to 



