186 THE MOUNTAINS OF CALIFORNIA 



in ten thousand is suffered to live through the many 

 vicissitudes of storm, drought, fire, and snow-crush 

 ing that beset their youth. 



The Douglas squirrel is the happy harvester of 

 most of the Sequoia cones. Out of every hundred 

 perhaps ninety fall to his share, and unless cut off 

 by his ivory sickle they shake out their seeds and 

 remain on the tree for many years. Watching the 

 squirrels at their harvest work in the Indian sum 

 mer is one of the most delightful diversions imagin 

 able. The woods are calm and the ripe colors are 

 blazing in all their glory ; the cone-laden trees stand 

 motionless in the warm, hazy air, and you may see 

 the crimson-crested woodcock, the prince of Sierra 

 woodpeckers, drilling some dead limb or fallen trunk 

 with his bill, and ever and anon filling the glens 

 with his happy cackle. The humming-bird, too, 

 dwells in these noble woods, and may oftentimes be 

 seen glancing among the flowers or resting wing- 

 weary on some leafless twig ; here also are the fa 

 miliar robin of the orchards, and the brown and 

 grizzly bears so obviously fitted for these majestic 

 solitudes ; and the Douglas squirrel, making more 

 hilarious, exuberant, vital stir than all the bears, 

 birds, and humming wings together. 



As soon as any accident happens to the crown of 

 these Sequoias, such as being stricken off by light 

 ning or broken by storms, then the branches be 

 neath the wound, no matter how situated, seem to 

 be excited like a colony of bees that have lost their 

 queen, and become anxious to repair the damage. 

 Limbs that have grown outward for centuries at 

 right angles to the trunk begin to turn upward to 



