22 THE BOTANY OF THE ROUTE. 



A backwoodsman, with liis axe alone, can, in a few days, make out of one of these cedars 

 a comfoi'table cabin, splitting it into timbers and boards with the greatest ease. This the 

 Indians did long before an iron axe was known among them, using stone hatchets, and wedges 

 of the crabapple. They also make from its trunk those celebrated canoes, which have an 

 elegance and lightness superior to any other except the fragile shells of birch-bark used further 

 north. The following facts will show the wonderful durability of the wood of this cedar, which 

 excels that of its eastern relatives, as seen in the peat-bogs of New Jersey, (Cupressvs 

 TJiuyoid&s, the "white cedar:") 



In the damp, dark forests close to the coast I have seen its trunks lying prostrate with 

 several spruces, from three to four feet in diameter, growing upon them, having evidently 

 taken root in the decaying bark, and extended their roots into the ground adjoining, while 

 the interior of the log I found still sound, though partially bored by insects. Judging of the 

 age of the spruces by ordinary rules, this log must have thus lain hundreds of years exposed 

 to the full action of one of the most moist of climates. 



On some of the tide-meadows about Shoalwater bay dead trees of this species only are 

 standing, sometimes in groves, whose age must bo immense, though impossible to tell 

 accurately.. 



They evidently lived and grew when the surface was above high-water level, groves of this 

 and other species still flourishing down to the very edge of inundation. But a gradual, slow 

 sinking of the land (which seems in places to be still progressing, and is perhaps caused by the 

 undermining of quicksands) has caused the overflow of the tides, and thus killed the forests, 

 of which the only remains now left are these cedars. This wood is perfectly sound, and so well 

 seasoned as to be the very best of its kind. 



Continued and careful examination of such trees may afford important information as to the 

 changes of level in these shores. That these have been numerous and great is further shown 

 by alternating beds of marine shells and of logs and stumps, often in their natural position, 

 which form the cliffs about the bay to a height of 200 feet. But while these remains show 

 that the changes took place in the latest periods of the miocene tertiary epoch, there is no 

 evidence in the gigantic forests living on these cliffs that anj^ sudden or violent change has 

 occurred since they began to grow — a period estimable rather by thousands than by hundreds 

 of years. 



This cedar is most abundant near the coast, but common also in damp forests nearly to the 

 top of the Cascade range, and is known to extend northward to the western slope of the Rocky 

 mountains, growing at a high elevation along their summits into Utah. It is recognizable by 

 its foliage and cones, both resembling those of the arbor-vitae of Canada, but larger. Its 

 bark, too, is thin, coming off in long riband-like strings, of which the Indians make bags and 

 articles of dress. It has been suggested as a good material for the manufacture of paper. 



The hemlock spruce (Abies Canadensis?) is generally considered the same species as that 

 found in the Atlantic States, but which does not extend north or west of Lake Winnipeg. It 

 differs on the western coast only in superior size, which is often from six to eight feet in 

 diameter and over a hundred and fifty feet in height; while three feet diameter and eighty feet 

 high seem to be the maximum size of those near the Atlantic. It is found scattered through 

 the forests from the subalpine regions down to the coast, mostly in the dampest portions, but 

 nowhere forming forests by itself. 



The "Oregon yew," (Taxus brevifolia,) also much larger than that of Canada, though 



