THE FOEESTS 213 



occur in clusters, about an inch wide, down among 

 the leaves, and, as they are colored bright rose- 

 purple, they give rise to a lively, flowery appearance 

 little looked for in such a tree. 



Pines are commonly regarded as sky-loving trees 

 that must necessarily aspire or die. This species 

 forms a marked exception, creeping lowly, in com 

 pliance with the most rigorous demands of climate, 

 yet enduring bravely to a more advanced age than 

 many of its lofty relatives in the sun-lands below. 

 Seen from a distance, it would never be taken for 

 a tree of any kind. Yonder, for example, is Cathe 

 dral Peak, some three miles away, with a scattered 

 growth of this pine creeping like mosses over the 

 roof and around the beveled edges of the north 

 gable, nowhere giving any hint of an ascending 

 axis. When approached quite near it still appears 

 matted and heathy, and is so low that one expe 

 riences no great difficulty in walking over the top of 

 it. Yet it is seldom absolutely prostrate, at its 

 lowest usually attaining a height of three or four 

 feet, with a main trunk, and branches outspread 

 and intertangled above it, as if in ascending they 

 had been checked by a ceiling, against which they 

 had grown and been compelled to spread horizon 

 tally. The winter snow is indeed such a ceiling, last 

 ing half the year ; while the pressed, shorn surface 

 is made yet smoother by violent winds, armed with 

 cutting sand-grains, that beat down any shoot that 

 offers to rise much above the general level, and carve 

 the dead trunks and branches in beautiful patterns. 



During stormy nights I have often camped 

 snugly beneath the interlacing arches of this little 



