154 THE MOUNTAINS OF CALIFOKNIA 



placed on his left arm a sleeve of raccoon skin and stood 

 on the defensive. Being quite sure that conduct was 

 prompted by fear and not by hostile intentions, the poor 

 fellow having* probably never seen such a being as myself 

 before, I laid my gun at my feet on the ground and waved 

 my hand for him to come to me, which he did slowly and 

 with great caution. I then made him place his bow and 

 quiver of arrows beside my gun, and striking a light gave 

 him a smoke out of my own pipe and a present of a few 

 beads. With my pencil I made a rough sketch of the cone 

 and pine tree which I wanted to obtain, and drew his at 

 tention to it, when he instantly pointed with his hand to 

 the hills fifteen or twenty miles distant towards the south ; 

 and when I expressed my intention of going thither, cheer 

 fully set out to accompany me. At midday I reached my 

 long-wished-f or pines, and lost 110 time in examining them 

 and endeavoring to collect specimens and seeds. New and 

 strange things seldom fail to make strong impressions, 

 and are therefore frequently over-rated; so that, lest I 

 should never see my friends in England to inform them 

 verbally of this most beautiful and immensely grand tree, 

 I shall here state the dimensions of the largest I could 

 find among several that had been blown down by the wind. 

 At 3 feet from the ground its circumference is 57 feet 9 

 inches ; at 134 feet, 17 feet 5 inches ; the extreme length 

 245 feet. . . . As it was impossible either to climb the 

 tree or hew it down, I endeavored to knock off the cones 

 by firing at them with ball, when the report of my gun 

 brought eight Indians, all of them painted with red earth, 

 armed with bows, arrows, bone-tipped spears, and flint- 

 knives. They appeared anything but friendly. I explained 

 to them what I wanted, and they seemed satisfied and sat 

 down to smoke ; but presently I saw one of them string 

 his bow, and another sharpen his flint knife with a pair of 

 wooden pincers and suspend it 011 the wrist of his right 

 hand. Further testimony of their intentions was unne- 



