THE TWO OLDEST TREES 



You cannot make an oval or a round 

 piece of fossilized wood by pressure; it 

 must have occurred in advance of the 

 fossilization, and it is my opinion that the 

 trees of oval form are largely of the fam- 

 ily of palmetto, both tall and ground 

 varieties. These have for their main 

 structure a much softer or pulpy body. 

 If not palmetto they were defective trees 

 of other species which had weakened 

 under ordinary pressure. In no other 

 wood fossilization do I find these oval 

 or flattened trees. 



It was my experience in Michigan, dur- 

 ing the early days of lumbering, that 

 much down timber was met with and that 

 in almost every case where the trees had 

 been "hollow hearted" before falling it 

 was flattened as it struck the ground, in 

 other words made oval, appearing exactly 

 as does the oval trunks of the stone trees. 



The pine and cypress, are subject to 

 such a condition as they reach maturity, 



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