168 OUR NATIONAL PARKS 



with blue and purple, red and yellow blossoms, 

 each tree with a gigantic panicle of flowers fifty 

 to a hundred feet long. Yet strange to say 

 they are seldom noticed. Few travel through 

 the woods when they are in bloom, the flowers 

 of some of the showiest species opening before 

 the snow is off the ground. Nevertheless, one 

 would think the news of such gigantic flowers 

 would quickly spread, and travelers from all the 

 world would make haste to the show. Eager 

 inquiries are made for the bloomtime of rhodo- 

 dendron-covered mountains and for the bloom- 

 time of Yosemite streams, that they may be en- 

 joyed in their prime ; but the far grander outburst 

 of tree bloom covering a thousand mountains — 

 who inquires about that? That the pistillate 

 flowers of the pines and firs should escape the 

 eyes of careless lookers is less to be wondered 

 at, since they mostly grow aloft on the topmost 

 branches, and can hardly be seen from the foot 

 of the trees. Yet even these make a magnificent 

 show from the top of an overlooking ridge when 

 the sunbeams are pouring through them. But 

 the far more numerous staminate flowers of the 

 pines in large rosy clusters, and those of the 

 silver firs in countless thousands on the under 

 side of the branches, cannot be hid, stand where 

 you may. The mountain hemlock also is glori- 

 ously colored with a profusion of lovely blue 

 and purple flowers, a spectacle to gods and men. 



