NATURAL HISTORY STUDIES 



not covering an inch), and it was only 39 feet in 

 circumference ten feet from the ground, but it had 

 attained the age of 2,171 years and a height approach- 

 ing 300 feet. 



Professor Dudley showed the extraordinary vital- 

 ity of the Big Tree by tracing out the way in which 

 many of them had been able to " heal " or cover 

 over great wounds made by fire. What a tree does 

 is not to revive what has been killed that is 

 impossible but to extend or fold its living tissue 

 over the wound. The covering process may take 

 scores of years. 



The tree already referred to, which began its 

 existence in 271 B.C., was about twelve feet in 

 circumference (just above the base ) at the beginning 

 of the Christian era. When it was 516 years old 

 (A.D. 245) it suffered a burn three feet wide, and 105 

 years were occupied in healing this wound. When 

 it was 1,712 years old (A.D. 1441) it suffered two bad 

 burns. One hundred and thirty -nine years of growth 

 followed, including the time occupied by the covering 

 of the two wounds. When it was 1,851 years old 

 (A.D. 1580) it suffered from a burn two feet wide 

 which took fifty-six years to heal. When it was 2,068 

 years old (A.D. 1797) a tremendous fire burned a 

 great scar 18 feet wide with a height estimated 

 at 30 feet. In the 103 more years that it continued 

 to live before it was killed, the tree had reduced the 

 wound to fourteen feet in width, and it might have 

 finished it in A.D. 2250, or thereabouts. This " Big 

 Tree " stands practically alone, " sublime among 

 living objects in its ability to withstand an injury 



132 



