178 NATURE AND WOODCRAFT. 



CHAPTER XVI. 



A PINE-WOOD STUDY. 



TnE dying sun sends a blaze of purple light 

 and throws a lurid crimson over the shaggy 

 pine trunks. The Cock of the Woods crows 

 from the pine-plumed gloom, and the light 

 shoots upward. Then the tall columns range 

 themselves into aisles, and nought but silence 

 possesses them. Deep depths of pine-needles 

 have blotted out all fair vegetation, and the 

 genii that guard the forest solitudes are great 

 Eagle-owls, for ever night-haunting in famine 

 for prey. 



Rugged and corrugated bark covers the floor ; 

 and a fallen monster has crashed through the 

 branches of surrounding trees. For the Pine, 

 even when set amid its own wild heather, is 

 never deep-rooted. On the bare brae, its roots 



