The Abbeville press and banner. [volume] (Abbeville, S.C.) 1869-1924, 1880-08-25

room for thirty-two persons to dance
four sets of cotilions at the same time.
The feat has often been performed.
Between five and six feet from the
ground, across the solid wood of the
stump, the distance is.twenty-fvc feet,
and, nth bark included, twenty-eight
feet. The Mariposa grove comprises a
tract about two miles square and is the
property of the State of California. It
is situated six miles distant from the
Big Tree station, on the Mariposa trail
due south of the hotels in the valley.
The average size Of the trees is greater
than that of any other grove in the
State, but the average height is inferior
to that of the trees of Calveras. Here
are in reality two distinct groves-the
upper one containing 365 big trees
over a foot in diameter, and the lower
about one half as many. In the upper
grove are at least ten trees over eighty
feet in circumference, and l25 over forty
feet in circumference. Several trees
here, badly burned, were originally over
100 feet in circumference, while others,
yet in the full vigor of their growth,
show proportions but little inferior.
Most of the trees have been numbered
instead of named like those of Gala
veras; and complete description would
show wonders the half of which has not
yet been told. The principal tree in
either grove is the one known rs the
Grizzly Giant" and the eye and sense
of the spectator are at once bewildered
at the size of its mighty proportions.
At the base of this tree the carriage
road stops, and the trail for horses
begins. "Golly, that's a whopper!"
said one of our party as we approached ;
and soon we all named this mighty
wonder the grandest of the Mariposa
grove. Carefully measuring the cir
cumference with line carried for that
purpose, we found it to be over ninety
three feet at the base, and this not count
ing the burnt away portions, which
would nave made the total still greater.
We measured thiTty-one feet as the
diameter. At the base were five OPEN
ings, any one of which seemed large
enough tor the accommodation of a
camping party; and Immediately around
these the bark was gone. From the
ground to height Of about eleven feet
the tree contracted perceptibly; then,
perfectly round, it shot up with scarcel Z
a change to the lowest limbs, which
were fully 100 feet from the ground. On
one side were about ten limbs, varying
from two to six feet in diameter,
and on the other about twelve almost
as large. The largest limb was probably
$50 teet from the ground, and this was
fully twenty feet in circumference where
it LETT the trunk Shooting out in a
straight line for q distance OF thirty feet
or more, it curved then suddenly upward
in perpendicular direction, and ut 3
distance of seventy-tive feet more was
lost in the upper foliage. Secondary
branches, as large as full-grown east
ern oak. shot out from this primary
branch as a trunk, and there again pro-
duced other branches, to the third and
fourth generation. Some of these
branches were decayed; some were
moss covered; some were in the full
vigor of their extraordinary growth.
The top of the tree seemed to have been
bl oxen off, perhaps by lightning; and
the appearance of the whole was that. of
a war-worn veteran of the Sierra. 1t
was near dusk when we had finished
our inspection OF this mighty tree. We
were over n mile above the LEI FL Of the
sea, and six miles from our stopping
place for the night. Still we fingered.
Although it was June, yet the eternal
SHOWS of the noun tains were every
where around US. and, as the huge banks
- sfr un 4.
tance, the melting power of heat and the
elements was on every side dehed. Not
a weed or blade of gress relieved the
monotony of the view; not the chirping
of an insect or the twitterinc of n bird
was heard. The solemn stiffness of the
night added 6 weird grandeur to the
scene. Now and then breath Of wind
stirred the topmost branches of the
pines md cedars. and, as they swayed
to and fro in the air, the music was like
that of Ossian, pleasant but mourntul
to the soul. There were sequolas on
every side almost twice as high as the
Falls of Niagara; there were pines rival
ing the dome of the capitol at Washing
ton in grandeur; there were cedars to
whose tops the monument OF Bunker
Hill would not have reached. There
were trees which were in the full vigor
of manhood bef>rc America itself was
discovered; there were Others which
were yet old before Charlemagnc was
born; there were others still growing
when the Savior himself was on the
earth. There were trees which had
witnessed the winds and storms OF
twenty centuries; there were others
which would endure long after count
less generations of the future would be
mum bered with the past. There were
trees crooked and short and massive:
there were others straight and tall and
slender. There were pines whose limbs
were as evenly proportioned rs those OF
the Apollo Belvedere; there were cedars
whose beauty was rot surpassed IN
their counterparts of Lebanon; there
were frs whose graceful foliage was
like thas tabled locks of the gods Of
ancient story. 1t was q picture IN
nature which captivated the sense at
once by its grandeur and extent; and,
as we drove back to Clark's through six
miles of this forest luxuriance, with
the darkness falling about us like, a
black curtain from the heavens, and the
mighty canons of the Sierra sinking
away from our pathway like the open.
ings to another world. t.lcn 1t was not
power but majesty; not beauty, hut sub
Unity; not the natural, but the super
which seemed above us and
before us.