What a magnificent tree this must have 

 been in its best estate ! The wide space of 

 400 miles between its present home and that 

 of the next species northward may indicate 

 the ground it has lost and predict the im- 

 pending doom of this heroic but unfortunate 

 pine. 



What California poet will pay a visit to 

 these lone survivors, gaze upon the many 

 deep pits in the hard soil where stood their 

 ancestors, and give to the world a threnody, 

 "The Passing of the Pine" ? 



One coast pine at least is well known to 

 many citizens of west-central California, the 

 Monterey Pine (P. radiata), much used for 

 ornamenting parks and pleasure grounds of 

 the coast towns, and highly prized for the 

 dense, dark-green leaves clothing its long, 

 spreading limbs, interspersed with light-yellow, 

 curiously-knobbed cones. 



With headquarters on Point Pinos, it ranges 

 southward to San Simeon Bay and northward 

 to Pescadero. The leaves, four to six inches 

 long, are in threes ; the cones, usually pro- 

 duced in circles about the limbs, are strongly 

 declined, ovate, four to six inches long, and 

 often weighing half a pound ; and the scales 

 on the outside near the base are enlarged to 

 hemispherical knobs, often one-half inch high. 

 Usually the cones do not fall at maturity, but 

 are caught in the thick bark of the tree and 

 carried outward through life. Trees near 

 Pacific Grove may be seen ^retaining all the 

 cones they have borne a most interesting phe- 

 nomenon. 



The length of time that a pine cone remains 

 upon the tree usually depends upon the length 

 of the cone stem. The cones of the four Nut 

 Pines of the interior arid region are stem- 

 less, sitting flat on the branches, and so are 

 pushed off at maturity. The half-inch stems 



(32) 



