144 THE MOUNTAINS OF CALIFORNIA 



This general order of distribution, with reference 

 to climate dependent on elevation, is perceived at 

 once, but there are other harmonies, as far-reaching 

 in this connection, that become manifest only after 

 patient observation and study. Perhaps the most 

 interesting of these is the arrangement of the forests 

 in long, curving bands, braided together into lace- 

 like patterns, and outspread in charming variety. 

 The key to this beautiful harmony is the ancient gla 

 ciers ; where they flowed the trees followed, tracing 

 their wavering courses along canons, over ridges, 

 and over high, rolling plateaus. The Cedars of Leb 

 anon, says Hooker, .are growing upon one of the 

 moraines of an ancient glacier. All the forests of 

 the Sierra are growing upon moraines. But mo 

 raines vanish like the glaciers that make them. 

 Every storm that falls upon them wastes them, cut 

 ting gaps, disintegrating boulders, and carrying 

 away their decaying material into new formations, 

 until at length they are no longer recognizable by 

 any save students, who trace their transitional forms 

 down from the fresh moraines still in process of for 

 mation, through those that are more and more an 

 cient, and more and more obscured by vegetation 

 and all kinds of post-glacial weathering. 



Had the ice-sheet that once covered all the range 

 been melted simultaneously from the foot-hills to 

 the summits, the flanks would, of course, have been 

 left almost bare of soil, and these noble forests 

 would be wanting. Many groves and thickets would 

 undoubtedly have grown up on lake and avalanche 

 beds, and many a fair flower and shrub would have 

 found food and a dwelling-place in weathered nooks 



