202 



yet even then it is distinctive enough to detect easily as 

 an unmistakable mark of the tree's identity. Its leaves, 

 like all those of the true spruces, are four-sided. They 

 are also noticeably curved, tapering down to a sharply 

 acute point. In character they are stout and stiff, which 

 botanists call rigid, and are about an inch long. On the 

 upperside they are light green, but on the underside are 

 beautifully glaucous and silvery. It is this which gives 

 the delicate, lightish cast to the tree's foliage. Its cones 

 are from three to five inches long, cylindrical-oblong, of 

 a lustrous light-brown. In form of growth the outline 

 of the tree is rather conical or pyramidal, with strong, 

 horizontal branches which sweep out from the trunk in 

 broken whorls. If you take the path northerly from 

 Bow Bridge and follow it to the east from its third fork, 

 you will easily find the mushroom shelter. 



Finns ponderosa. (Western Yellow Pine. No. 82.) 

 You will find a healthy young specimen of this sturdy 

 stock in the northwesterly part of the Ramble, not far 

 from the slippery elm. Follow the path which passes 

 the slippery elm. Just around the corner from the point 

 where it breaks off from the Walk, running east and 

 west, you will find this fine young pine. In order that 

 you may surely find it, as you go from the fork upon 

 the Walk leading by the slippery elm, you pass witch- 

 hazel and sweet gum, on the right (as you go northerly 

 toward the west Ramble Road stop), and on the left, in 

 the corner of the fork, the fine clump of retinosporas, 

 alluded to and described below. The sweet gum has 

 star-shaped leaves and the witch-hazel's leaves are lop- 

 sided. The retinosporas have finely-sprayed, plume- 



