VITALITY OF THE SEQUOIA GIGANTEA DUDLEY 41 



no accident occasioning pain or suffering or the extinction of human life 

 has left a stain on the history of its growth. Tragedies and great passions, 

 as we have seen, have crossed its silent life, but they have been the elemental 

 passions of fire and storm, clean and wholesome, and the tree has been 

 stimulated by them to a greater and more vigorous growth. Indeed, there 

 is something sublime in the patience of the task and the completeness of its 

 execution when, after centuries of slow rebuilding, we see every outward trace 

 of its injuries eliminated and a robust and uninterrupted life again at- 

 tained. 



Mr. James Bryce, in his sketch of the life of the late Lord Acton, 

 Professor of History at the University of Cambridge, says: "Twenty years 

 ago, at midnight in his library at Cannes he expounded to me how a history 

 of Liberty might be written and in what way it might be made the central 

 thread of all history. He spoke like a man inspired, seeming as if from some 

 mountain summit high in air he saw beneath him the far winding path of 

 human progress, from dim Cimmerian shores of prehistoric shadow, into the 

 fuller, yet broken and fitful light of the modern time. * * * it was 

 as if the whole landscape of history had been suddenly lit up by a burst of 

 sunlight. I had never heard from any other lips any discourse like this, nor 

 from his did I hear the like again." '^ 



The impression made was not dissimilar, on that cloudless October 

 afternoon with the crimson leaves of the dogwood and the yellow oak fall- 

 ing silently in the Sierra forests, as one patiently wrought out with lens, 

 measure, pencil and camera the great history of the Sequoia above named, 

 year by year, century by century; centuries of peace, years of tragedy, and 

 again centuries of stimulated growth. It was as if the whole landscape 

 of life, from the dim prehistoric forests until now, "had been suddenly lit 

 up by a burst of sunlight." I had never heard from any other lips any dis- 

 course like this, nor from this fallen seer and patriarch could I hear the like 

 again. 



During the past ten years hardly a season has passed but I have camped 

 among the Sequoias. I am glad to say I have visited nearly all the groves, 

 but I regret to say that a considerable proportion of them is in private 

 hands; some have been leveled already and the mills are busy in not less 

 than four others, notwithstanding there is little profit in the lumbering. 

 These groves of Sequoias form a question apart from the ordinary questions 

 of forestry. In the heart of the Sierra forests they are, it is true, an im- 

 portant part of the protective forest cover of the headwaters of California 

 rivers; but I believe you will now join me in the assertion that they have 

 an interest for the citizens of California, for the cultivated traveler and the 



