196 Musings by Camp- Fire and Wayside 



from two hundred to two hundred and fifty feet. 

 The largest of these trees are not now to be found 

 near to the railways, having been sent to the saw- 

 mills. But I found a good specimen not far from 

 the city. It is forty-four feet in circumference, 

 measured ten feet above the roots. I desired to 

 obtain a good photograph of it, but as usual had no 

 sunlight. However, I stood Dr. Jackson near it, 

 and did the best I could under a cloudy sky. I 

 think likely it will make a pretty good engraving, 

 after all. The bark is most massive and deeply 

 creased. They are, therefore, not so easily killed 

 by forest fires as our northern pines. 



The woods are as white with dog-wood now as 

 in Virginia. A man who had developed horny hoofs 

 in Wisconsin would be regarded as an infantile 

 pink-toe here. They know him by his look of 

 astonishment at the size of the firs, and of the fish- 

 lies. A native said he had crossed a river by riding 

 through a hollow tree that had fallen athwart the 

 stream. When asked if it had been conveniently 

 broken off on the far side, he said no, that he rode 

 out through a knot-hole. This was not told for a 

 big story, it was told for a big fact. There is a 

 stream up in the mountains from which a trout has 

 never been landed. They bite like the — well, you 

 know the favorite comparison of a Rock Mountain- 

 eer — but they smash every kind of tackle that can 

 be brought against them. Rods, reels, lines, snells, 

 and religion go to flinders. Fish-consecrated per- 



