What a magnificent tree this must have 
been in its best estate! The wide space of 
400 miles between its present home and that 
of the next species northward may indicate 
the ground it has lost and predict the im¬ 
pending doom of this heroic but unfortunate 
pine. 
What California poet will pay a visit to 
these lone survivors, gaze upon the many 
deep pits in the hard soil where stood their 
ancestors, and give to the world a threnody,— 
“The Passing of the Pine”? 
One coast pine at least is well known to 
many citizens of west-central California, the 
Monterey Pine ( P. radiata ), much used for 
ornamenting parks and pleasure grounds of 
the coast towns, and highly prized for the 
dense, dark-green leaves clothing its long, 
spreading limbs, interspersed with light-yellow, 
curiously-knobbed cones. 
With headquarters on Point Pinos, it ranges 
southward to San Simeon Bay-and northward 
to Pescadero. The leaves, four to six inches 
long, are in threes; the cones, usually pro¬ 
duced in circles about the limbs, are’ strongly 
declined, ovate, four to six inches long, and 
often weighing half a pound; and the scales 
on the outside near the base are enlarged to 
hemispherical knobs, often one-half inch high. 
Usually the cones do not fall at maturity, but 
are caught in the thick bark of the tree and 
carried outward through life. Trees near 
Pacific Grove may be seen retaining all the 
cones they have borne—a most interesting phe¬ 
nomenon. 
The length of time that a pine cone remains 
upon the tree usually depends upon the length 
of the cone stem. The cones of the four Nut 
Pines of the interior arid region are stem¬ 
less, sitting flat on the branches, and so are 
pushed off at maturity. The half-inch stems 
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