A THOUSAND-YEAR PINE 



only the splitting of the affected parts 

 revealed these records, all filled with 

 pitch and preserved for nearly nine 

 hundred years. 



Following this, an even tenor 

 marked his life for nearly three cen- 

 turies. This quiet existence came to 

 an end in the summer of 1301, when a 

 stroke of lightning tore a limb out of 

 his round top and badly shattered a 

 shoulder. He had barely recovered 

 from this injury when a violent wind 

 tore off several of his arms. During 

 the summer of 1348 he lost two of his 

 largest arms. These were sound, and 

 more than a foot in diameter at the 

 points of breakage. As these were 

 broken by a down-pressing weight or 

 force, we may attribute the breaks to 

 accumulations of snow. 

 21 



