Conifers 
everything about them gives an archaic or, shall we 
say, a “Jurassic” look. The stiff, clumsy branching, the 
solid, thick, and knobby stem, with a swollen bulging at 
the base, is altogether unlike anything that we are ac- 
customed to. Their large seeds used to be the main 
support of some of those fierce Indian tribes in Southern 
Chile who were never conquered by the Spaniards even 
after 250 years of continual warfare. They are more 
ancient even than those other fine conifers which occur 
in the forests of the Andes farther to the south, such 
as Fitzroya, Libocedrus, and Saxegothea, all of which 
belong to an ancient group of conifers, 
In the extreme south of South America they are 
perhaps being crowded out by the antarctic beech, 
which is more hardy and perhaps better fitted for the 
terrible storms and icy blizzards of that savage and 
even to-day almost unexplored territory. 
The way in which these archaic coniferous genera, 
and especially Araucaria, appear in the most unexpected 
places all about the Pacific, is perhaps best explained 
by supposing that they really are the last isolated 
remnants of the most ancient tree type in the world, 
which have just managed to survive in odd and out 
of the way islands and mountain woods (see p, 282). 
The general distribution of the more modern pines, 
spruces, and larches quite agrees, however, with the 
theory that they are preliminary associations, able to 
exist on poor land, in high mountains and the frozen 
north, but unable to compete with deciduous trees 
where the soil and climate is good and kindly. 
The appearance of a “forest primeval” differs of 
course in different latitudes. In the more northerly 
latitudes one is apt to be bitterly disappointed. The 
trees are scraggy, stumpy, badly grown, and loaded with 
old man’s beard and other lichens. In more genial 
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