MAMMOTH TREES. 179 



Californian red wood cedar, growing at least 300 

 feet in height, a specimen of which has been found 

 measuring 55 feet in circumference, * and the mam- 

 moth Sequoia Gigantea generally known in England 

 as the Wellingtonia, while the Americans insist 

 that it is the Washingtonia. These absurd cogno- 

 mens, named after men neither of whom ever saw the 

 trees, and the latter of whom was dead long before 

 they had been discovered, may well be left to settle 

 their respective claims among themselves. The Sequoia 

 Gigantea seems to have been first discovered by Douglas, 

 a British botanist and traveller in California, in 1831, 

 and one of its peculiarities is that it does not grow 

 singly about the country, but only in groves, of which 

 the principal ones at present known are that in Calaveras 

 County, the Mariposa, the Fresno, and one or two other 

 minor groves of these the largest trees are still said to be 

 original "Big Tree Grove" in Calaveras ; where at the 

 time of our visit there was a tree lying on the ground, 

 partly destroyed by fire, which competent judges de- 

 clared must have been 450 feet high and 60 feet in 

 girth. It was called the "Father of the Forest" and 

 there were others still standing not very much smaller 

 than this giant. In the Mariposa grove, which contains 

 nearly 1000 trees, the largest specimen is said to be 

 325 feet high and 92 feet in circumference. Most of 

 these trees are as straight as an arrow and are very 

 similar in this respect in all the groves, where they 

 constitute the perfection of natural beauty both in their 

 growth and colouring. The sight of their enormous 

 stems, rising up from the earth like gigantic natural 

 columns, sheathed in a bark of bright cinnamon red 



* Gordon's Pinetum, 1880, p. 379. 



