1906] GANONG—NASCENT FOREST OF MISCOU BEACH 07 
there is in adaptation, and how likely it is that adaptation will 
ultimately prove to be a matter of the loose and large rather than 
of the exact and minute. 
Finally, it is in this same situation, upon the upper slopes of 
the dune beaches, and usually, but not always, on the juniper 
mats, that the characteristic trees of the zone, the white spruce, 
Picea alba, develop. Standing in open formation, they do not 
interfere with one another’s growth, and in consequence become, 
q : ‘ 
BS Pan ie ae A nen 
Pre 9.—Typical large juniper mat on a slope and crest of a dune beach, with a 
number of associated plants noted in the text; looking south. 
except for wind effects, symmetrical in outline and clothed to the 
ground. They cccupy that situation no doubt for the same reason 
that the shrubs do, as a compromise between the greater wetness 
of the hollows and the greater dryness of the beach summits. This 
habit of growing thus upon the slopes, and not on summits or hol- 
lows, has a most important effect upon the physiognomy of the 
vegetation in this zone; for to it is due the openness of the swales, 
with their regular borders of trees, and as well the openness of the 
beach summits in the sandy woods later to be noticed. Toward 
the sea the spruces are small and dense, and often show, as in fig. 11, 
