310 OUR NATIONAL PARKS 



green branches at a height of perhaps two hun- 

 dred feet, entirely cut off from the ground-fires, 

 and looking like signal beacons on watch towers. 

 From one standpoint I sometimes saw a dozen or 

 more, those in the distance looking like great 

 stars above the forest roof. At first I could not 

 imagine how these Sequoia lamps were lighted, 

 but the very first night, strolling about waiting 

 and watching, I saw the thing done again and 

 again. The thick, fibrous bark of old trees is 

 divided by deep, nearly continuous furrows, the 

 sides of which are bearded with the bristling ends 

 of fibres broken by the growth swelling of the 

 trunk, and when the fire comes creeping around 

 the feet of the trees, it runs up these bristly fur- 

 rows in lovely pale blue quivering, bickering rills 

 of flame with a low, earnest whispering sound to 

 the lightning-shattered top of the trunk, which, 

 in the dry Indian summer, with perhaps leaves 

 and twigs and squirrel-gnawed cone-scales and 

 seed-wings lodged in it, is readily ignited. These 

 lamp-lighting rills, the most beautiful fire streams 

 I ever saw, last only a minute or two, but the big 

 lamps burn with varying brightness for days and 

 weeks, throwing off sparks like the spray of a 

 fountain, while ever and anon a shower of red 

 coals comes sifting down through the branches, 

 followed at times with startling effect by a big 

 burned-off chunk weighing perhaps half a ton. 

 The immense bonfires where fifty or a hundred 



