216 
SKELETON TREES. 
bis blood. We then forced our way breast-high 
in tangled brushwood, long, hard grass, and 
creepers and bamboos, up the sloping sides of the 
sea-skirting hills, and when we reached the top, we 
found it comparatively level, and instead of being 
breast-high in bnishwood, were agreeably surprised 
to see it knee-deep in flowers — peonies, monks- 
hood, Hoteias, and Camj^anulas. In such a scene 
the trees are large, and animal life in various forms 
is astir. The pied woodpecker is scrutinising the 
Avhcreal:>outs of grubs, and giving now and then 
an inquiring tap, while the little striped ground- 
squirrel plays at hide-and-seek among the branches 
of fallen trees. The head of a startled deer may be 
seen for an instant — a long brown nose, and two 
mild inquiring eyes — and then a 2:>ortioij of his other 
extremity, as he bounds away in the dim vistas of 
the trees. 
One thing that strikes us in this wild green 
wilderness is the j)i'odigious number of those 
charred and blackened trees that strew the ground 
in every direction, though often so overgrown with 
