THE FOREST IN WINTER. 211 
as a winter reservoir of moisture in countries with a cold and 
dry atmosphere, has not attracted so much attention in France 
and Northern Europe as it deserves in the United States, 
where an excessive climate renders that function of the woods 
more important. 
In New England, irregular as the climate is, the first 
autumnal snows usually fall before the ground is frozen at all, 
or when the frost extends at most to the depth of only a few 
inches. In the woods, especially those situated upon the 
elevated ridges which supply the natural irrigation of the soil 
and feed the perennial fountains and streams, the ground 
remains covered with snow during the winter; for the trees 
protect the snow from blowing from the general surface into 
the depressions, and new accessions are received before the 
covering deposited by the first fall is melted. Snow is of a 
color unfavorable for radiation, but, even when it is of consid¬ 
erable thickness, it is not wdiolly impervious to the rays of the 
sun, and for this reason, as well as from the warmth of lower 
strata, the frozen crust, if one has been formed, is soon thawed, 
and does not again fall below the freezing point during the 
winter. 
The snow in contact with the earth now begins to melt, 
with greater or less rapidity, according to the relative temper¬ 
ature of the earth and the air, while the water resulting from 
its dissolution is imbibed by the vegetable mould, and carried 
off by infiltration so fast that both the snow and the layers of 
leaves in contact with it often seem comparatively dry, when, 
in fact, the under surface of the former is in a state of per¬ 
petual thaw. No doubt a certain proportion of the snow is 
returned to the atmosphere by direct evaporation, but in the 
woods it is partially protected from the action of the sun, and 
as very little water runs off in the winter by superficial water¬ 
courses, except in rare cases of sudden thaw, there can be no 
question that much the greater part of the snow deposited in 
the forest is slowly melted and absorbed by the earth. 
The quantity of snow that falls in extensive forests, far 
from the open country, has seldom been ascertained by direct 
