259 Geology and Botany of Northern Pacific Railroad. 



impenetrable by the sun's rays. Sometimes the gloom of these 

 forests is further enhanced by gray or black lichens, which drape 

 the trunks and hang from the dead branches like the Spanish 

 moss, but producing a far more funereal effect. Where fire has 

 run through these forests, the trees, killed but not consumed, 

 and subsequently overthrown by the wind, form a labyrinth 

 through which it is sometimes well-nigh impossible to force one's 

 way. The ground thus open to the sunshine is soon covered 

 by a dense growth of bracken (Pteris aquilina), which often 

 reaches a height of from six to eight feet. After this or with it, 

 comes Ceanothus or manzanita, with huckleberries and service- 

 berries, which fruit so abundantly as even to tint the mountain 

 sides with the black, purple or blue of their berries. 



The larch, to which reference has already been made, is scat- 

 tered sparsely over the eastern slope of the Cascades, and it here 

 attains its maximum dimensions. The trunk is sometimes 200 

 feet in height, the branches relatively small, and the foliage fine 

 and delicate in color, so that the larger trees look like lofty col- 

 umns wreathed and decorated by climbing vines. 



The hard-wood trees are few and insignificant as compared 

 with the conifers. In the gorges and along the streams are the 

 narrow-leaved and trembling poplars, and on the uplands the 

 large-leaved maple and chinquapin (Acer maorophyllum and Cas- 

 tanopsis chrysophylla) ; the first is the only real tree-maple of 

 the west coast. It attains a height of 75 to 80 feet, and the 

 leaves, averaging six inches in diameter, on young plants are 

 sometimes many times as large. The chinquapin, though usually 

 a shrub, occasionally forms a handsome tree 30 to 50 feet in 

 height, conspicuous for the contrast between the bright green 

 of the upper and the golden yellow of the under surface of its 

 leaves. 



THE GORGE OF THE COLUMBIA. 



This is one of the most impressive and interesting topographi- 

 cal features in all the picturesque West. It is cut with a nearly 

 straight westerly course, across the whole breadth of the Cascade 

 Mountains, fifty miles, and its banks rise from 2,000 to 4,000 

 feet directly from the river side. Most of the material of which 

 the walls are composed is basalt. This can be seen to form dis- 



