VITALITY OF THE SEQUOIA GIGANTEA DUDLEY 39 



One hundred and thirty-nine years of growth followed, including the 

 time occupied by the covering of the two wounds. 



At 1,851 years of age (A. D. 1580) occurred another fire, causing a 

 burn on the trunk two feet wide, which took fifty-six years to heal. 



Two hundred and seventeen years of growth followed the fire. 



When the tree was 2,068 years old (in 1797) a tremendously aggressive 

 fire attacked the trunk (perhaps aided by the burning stem of a neighbor- 

 ing pine or fir) and burned the great scar eighteen feet wide with a height 

 estimated at thirty feet. The 103 years which had elapsed since 1797 had 

 reduced this to fourteen feet in width. If the same rate of growth con- 

 tinued without interruption a hazardous estimate and the tree had been 

 in possession of the United States and under its protection, the wound might 

 have been closed in three and one-half centuries more, or about the year 2250. 

 Four centuries and a half to repair in one tree the results of one forest 

 fire! If the tree had been a younger tree, less the victim of previous 

 fires, we are convinced that .such a healing would be possible. In any case 

 Sequoia gigantea practically stands alone, sublime among living objects in 

 its ability to withstand an injury of this magnitude, and to endure a sufficient 

 length of time for its complete recovery. 



It is to be noted that in the trunk next to each of the three older 

 burns described, there is a thin cavity chiefly occupied by the charcoal of 

 the burned surface (some of that formed in 245 was brought away), and 

 that this produced a pathologically protective covering, no doubt calculated 

 as well as any to prevent decay during the long period consumed in cover- 

 ing the wound with healthy tissue. But this will not account for all this 

 superb resistance to the attack of insect, fungus, ferment or microbe. Burned 

 areas of other trees have the same charred surface, but no oak or sycamore, 

 pine or Douglas spruce under similar conditions would remain so long with- 

 out being attacked in this region by some cause of decay. There is some- 

 thing in the sap of the Big Tree that is an elixir of life, something deposited 

 in the lignified cells of the normally formed layers of wood that resists in 

 an unexampled way the dreaded "tooth of time." The wound is finally 

 covered not healed, in the surgeon's sense the new tissue formed above 

 it is thickened, the tree is rounded to its original fullness, bark and wood 

 become continuous about the whole circumference, the latter forming in 

 rings of normal uniformity, the old healthful symmetry of life is re-estab- 

 lished, and no outward sign of distortion exists, or even a scar from the old 

 injury. Nevertheless, well within, and as the centuries pass, deeper and 

 deeper within the heart of the tree the wound exists unchanged and there- 

 fore no source of decay. 



