1 68 THE DOUGLAS FIR. 



was convinced of the truth of this statement when he sa\\ 

 in the dockyard at Plymouth, two masts for 74 gun ships, 

 which measured in the whole piece, 108 feet in length, and 

 the roller was everywhere 3 feet in diameter. Such a tree 

 must have been 200 feet long, and 5 feet or more in diameter." * 



But grand and majestic as these great specimens of 

 the Pinus Strobus undoubtedly are, they must yield 

 the palm to some of the pines of the forests of North 

 Western America. There are many other trees in 

 Canada and the Eastern States which are well worthy 

 of a short description, but we must hurry on to glance 

 at the gigantic trees found in the great primeval 

 forests of the Pacific coast. 



The first of these of which we shall speak is the 

 Abies Douglasii or Douglas fir, the finest specimens 

 of which have, we believe, been found in Vancouver 

 Island, and on the Frazer River, where it forms 

 extensive forests. It is one of the most beautiful and 

 valuable of all conifers, and grows to a size truly 

 gigantic. On the site of what is now Vancouver 

 city the present terminus of the Canadian Pacific 

 Railway and in the neighbourhood of that town, on 

 Burrard Inlet, was a renowned group of these trees, 

 and " many still standing around the city, are from 

 250 to 350 feet high and 12 feet in diameter at the 

 base, or about 36 feet in girth," f growing so close 

 together that the trees almost seem to touch each 

 other; for the same description goes on to say, that 

 " another thing which surprised us was the small 



* Description of the Genus Pinus, by A. B. Lambert, F.R.S., 1803, 

 Vol. i, p. 32. 



j- By Track and Trail through Canada, by Edward Roper, F.R.G.S., 

 1891, p. 185. 



