50 THE BOOK OF FORESTRY 
the openings in the canopy increase in height, they be- 
come larger in size and area as well, due to the falling 
of the encircling veterans. The seedlings become sap- 
lings; the giants fall, decay, become moss-covered, and 
finally go back to the soil from which they sprung, 
enriching it with the mold of their enormous trunks. 
The young saplings increase in length and girth, finally 
become veterans and in turn fall, to mold beneath the 
shade of their posterity. Long, long before, every trace 
of man’s handiwork has disappeared and the forest 
apparently untouched has reclaimed the land which 
man wrested from its grasp for so short a time. 
