THE WOODS. 9 



vision by which we were attended vanishes 

 forever ! 



We will return to a consideration of trees and 

 forests. The most unpromising feature in this 

 direction one soon comes upon after entering 

 the road. Here and there among the hoop-pole 

 wire birch are dead pines victims of fires that 

 killed them many years ago. They are too 

 crooked, and crotched, and beset with strong 

 limbs and knots, to serve for lumber; so they 

 remain, scattered, gaunt, bare and gray, reach- 

 ing out long naked arras defiantly to all winds. 

 They are merely touched with decay ; only the 

 " sap," or last growth, an inch or two in thick- 

 ness, has become tattered and weather-stricken ; 

 all the rest is sound and strong. These pines 

 are unlike those of the same species that grow 

 in the thick forests of their kind. In those 

 conditions there is hard competition for room 

 to live. There thousands of seeds of pine 

 sprout and begin to grow within a small area. 

 It is simply impossible for them all to reach 

 maturity, or even arrive to a height of a few 

 inches. They will be thinned out by natural 

 selection ; that is to say, those that are best fitted 

 to continue will live. The advantage may be 

 small, a mere bit more light or a better rootage 

 or sounder seed, but on these points their lives 



