206 Our Field and Forest Trees 



is no broad crown to bend under the weight of 

 gathering snow masses. 



In the Canadian forests the spruces point up- 

 ward " as straight as one could set a lance." 



On the high slopes of the Rockies, the mighty 

 shafts put out only short side-boughs, so short 

 that the trees look from a distance like poles gar- 

 landed with green. 



The northern snows cannot break such trees 

 as these. 



The wood of gymnosperms is peculiarly tough, 

 so that their small boughs can be bent nearly dou- 

 ble without snapping (Fig. 55). Hence, these 

 trees have been favorites with the makers of 

 bows. Before the days of gunpowder, English 

 archers shot their shafts from bows of yew, and 

 the American Indians made their bows of juniper 

 wood. 



Because the wood is tough and strong, the pine 

 long ago used to be called the sailor's tree. Before 

 steamboats were invented, and when the winds 

 moved all the ships on all the seas, it furnished 

 the favorite wood for masts and spars. 



But fellowship between the pines and the wind 

 began long before pine spars carried sails. 



The wind causes the gymnosperms to be born. 



They all bear their stamens and pistils in sep- 

 arate flowers, and send pollen from one flower 

 to another by the wind (Fig. ^6). 



They carried on their affairs in this way ages 



