CHAPTER XI. 



THE ROCKY MOUNTAIN EVERGREENS. 



We find here an altogether different class of trees from those 

 of the Eiast, and it would not seem as it they belonged to the 

 same continent. They appear to have been invented for en- 

 tirely different conditions. 



Not long ago I had a talk with M. Brugger, a banker at 

 Columbus, Neb. He Vfas born In Switzerland, amid the grand 

 mountain scenery, which sets people wild with rapture. I asked 

 him the difference between the two systems of mountains. He 

 said they were as widely different as if belonging to two worlds. 

 The air of one is soft and humid, clothing hill and mountain 

 with a freshness and greenness foreign to our own. Said he: 

 "With the same conditions your Colorado peaks would be 

 capped with glaciers and you would have far softer and more 

 beautiful scenery. Your mountains are piled up in the heart 

 of the arid regions, where rainfall is light and the air is dry. 

 Tou have vastness and grandeur. We have softness and beauty." 



This accounts for the fact that trees nurtured for millen- 

 ium's in these mountains are fitted for a like atmospheric re- 

 lation on the plains. While evergreens brought from Switzer- 

 land could not live a year on our bleak prairies, the Silver 

 Cedar and Ponderosa thrive under care far better than in their 

 own habitat. 



The Silver Sheen. This is a striking peculiarity of our 

 mountain trees, especially the Cedars, Spruces and Firs. What 

 is the cause of this? Probably the high altitude and the 

 shelter of the deep gorges. Tou seldom find these exquisite 

 colors in trees exposed to the full glare of the sun and the 

 full sweep of the winds. 



The most charming' and delicate shading Is found in the most 

 sheltered places, where the evolution of beauty has been going 

 on for ages, and those garments of more than courtly splendor 

 have descended from parent to child. This rare beauty Is a sort 

 of a bloom like that on a peach, which covers the needles and 

 Is easily rubbed off, so that a tree of rarest beauty exposed on 

 a bleak prairie, whipped and cuffed by the winds, must lose 

 much of Its attractiveness. 



