CALIFORNIA 
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great forests that sing in storm and sigh in the summer breeze, 
and the groups of sequoia overmatching in height and circum- 
ference any other conifers on the globe. There the clouds come 
down and kiss the mountains, and the lesson is renewed every 
day of eternal repose and majesty and strength. There is the 
fir tree with its balsam, clean and sanitary, inviting the invalid 
to come for his healing; there are the cedars more stately than 
those of Lebanon, and pines that were dropping their cones long 
before the first white man had set foot upon the continent. 
How little of all this reserve of natural wealth can be set forth 
by inventory or speech ! Hardly an impression has been made 
on these virgin forests. There is the great sanitary district, free 
from dust, with pure water flowing out of the granite, and an 
atmosphere as sweet as the breath of heaven. These mountains 
are not solitary, but are rich in floral and animal life. There 
butterflies flit, and birds sing, and huge grizzly bears come out 
of caves and caverns. There the mariposa lily iinfolds its petals, 
and the snow plant, red as blood, springs in a day mysteriously 
out of the margin of the receding banks of snow. There the 
lakes repose in bowls with mountains for rims. There, 8,000 
feet above the level of the sea, is lake Tahoe, more than 20 miles 
long and 1,500 feet deep, and more than five hundred lakelets 
mirror the frowning battlements that rise above them. Here 
are the great reservoirs that send their waters down to fertilize 
the hot valleys below. More than 4,000,000 acres of land are 
irrigated by these mountain streams, and made among the most 
productive in the state. Millions more will be watered from the 
great reservoirs that are held in check by these great forests, so 
that there is neither wasting flood nor withering drought. 
In that great mountain range there is one of the seven wonders 
of the world. From the ends of the earth men come to see the 
awful grandeur of Yosemite, which no artist can paint and no 
pen can adequately describe. They will look up to the mighty 
fall wliich, in three leaps, descends 2,600 feet to the floor of the 
valley. They will see the great Vernal and Nevada falls j)Our- 
ing out their miglity floods into the valley below. Standing on 
the floor of this valley, 4,000 feet above the level of the sea, the 
tourist looks up to these granite walls, varying in height from 
1,200 to 4,000 feet, hears the roar of the great cataracts, sees tho 
awful battlements where in the winter the snow banners lloat 
from their to|)s; sees the Bridal Veil lloating over a vertical wall 
and falling for nearly a thousand feet; watches the rainbows as 
