Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1905-09-21
TREES OF MAR|POsA
Most Impressive Of Califor-
MAS Arboreal Giants.
AGED MANY YEARS
INCIDENTS TOLD TO ILLUSTRATE
THEIR GREAT DIAMETER.
Danger From Forest Fires-Careless-
ness Of the Campers and Indiffer-
ence Of the Settlers.
AGED MANY YEARS

BY WILLIAM E. CURTIS.
Special Correspondence Of The Star and the Chicago
cord-Herald.
WAWONA, Cal. September 10, 1905.
We have seen several Of the big tree
groves of California, and agree that Mari
posa county has the most interesting and
impressive From the base Of the foothills
to the timber line on the breasts of Its
peaks the Sierra Nevada mountains are
covered with magnificent forests. There is
no other forest within human reach so ex-
tensive or showing such enormous growths,
and while the sequoia and redwoods are the
largest. the pines, cedars, frs, oaks and
other varieties are Of corresponding i'm
mensity. There is something peculiar
about the soil and climate of these noun
tains that has made them so. The Mari
posa grove. as I have said, is the finest we
have seen-an assemblage of the largest
and most magnificent examples Of the vege-
table kingdom known to botany. The
father Of them all is 1O6 feet in circum-
ference and more than $50 feet high-more
than two-thirds as high as the Washington
monument and almost as large in girth
The top Is twisted and broken and the
guides tell us that 1t was about seventy
five feet higher many years ago, but lost
its crest in a storm.
Great Diameter of the Trees.
There are us trees in one group, each Of
which is more than fifteen feet in diameter
and more than 800 feet high Most of them
are between twenty-five and thirty feet in
diameter and from eighty to a hundred feet
in circumference. You have seen pictures
OF the hole cut through the base of one Of
these trees with stage coach, loaded with
Att, t,rr fhrN, ,of c a
feature of every one of the seven forests.
Perhaps you have also seen the trunk OF
fallen giant lying upon the ground with
stage coach. loaded with passengers, dry
Ing it's full length. That trick was actually
performed, and was devised to gratlfy
New York gentleman, who paid the stage
driver for his trouble. The most striking
photograph. however to my MIND, Is one
that shows a troop of the 4th Cavalry, on
horseback, drilling uDon the trunk Of
fallen giant. l did not see the drill, but =!
have seen the tree, and there is plenty or
room upon the trunk. for squadron OF
horsemen to go through their maneuvers
The ball room'-the stump which has
been smoothed off and polished for dane
ing f1oor-is in the forest of Calaveras,
hundred miles to the north. 1t was orig
inally thirty-fve feet and eight inches III
diameter, and when the bark was taken
off there remained dancing floor twenty
five feet in diameter and seven feet from
the ground. The largest tree in the Calay-
eras forest, called the New York" Is lO4
feet in circumference. The Ohio Is io5
feet. Many of the trees are hollow at the
bottom They have been burned out by
forest fires and great rooms remain IN
the Tree of Refuge" in the Calaveras Tor
est sixteen steers were once FOUND huddieu
together seeking shelter In the trunk from
storm. When President Harrison was at
the Santa Cruz forest he assembled MS en-
tire party of forty-two people In the noi.
low trunk of tree in Whlch Geh fFetnon'
is said to have camped.
Little Nourishment Needed.
The bark upon these trees is often two
feet thick 1t Is generally from six TO eight
inches and beautifully mottled or futed ike
a granite column. The trunks taper slowly
their symmetry is very striking and they
are usually without a limb for hundred or
more feet from the ground. The largest
ones will average 300 feet In height and you
often find them 375 feet. Their limbs are
ragged and twisted; their foliage Is scanty,
due to the storms of five thousand years.
They grow closely together, sometimes tive,
three and even five springing from the same
roots and there are acres where the trees
are so closely grown that you can reach
from one to another with your finger tips.
The root system Is not extensive, nor Is II
deep 1t Is extraordinary that the trees
have lived for so many centuries and have
grown so large with so little soil and so
little moisture. Botanists say that they can
live almost on the nourishment from the
air and that Is where they have an advan-
tage over human beings. There are no but
tresses, like you see supporting the trunks
of monster trees in eastern forests, but they
rise out Of the soil without showing their
roots in most cases and stand squarely over
their own center of gravity. They do not
die or decay like other trees. and, although
you will find hundreds of them burned out
at the bottoms, so that the gap will shelter
a score of men or a squadron of cavalry,
yet the upper trunk and the branches will
be as firm and healthful as nature could
make them, and professional foresters, like
John Muir will tell you that among more
than five thousand Of these giants scattered
along the slopes of the Sierra Nevada
mountains, they have never seen but one
seQuoia tree which died a natural death.
That is famous. 1t lies the bank of
Boulder creek and was evidently starved to
death The rocky ravine where nature i'm
prisoned 1t furnished insufficient nourish-
ment and inadequate moisture, but 1t grew
and grew, until it became greater than any
could look over the tops of the forests
around 1t. Then one day it fell from it's
own weight and persisted.
Great Age Of the Trees.
Worms and other pests do not AFFECT the
sequoias. They seem immune from all the
diseases and dangers that afflict ordinary
trees. and even fire finds 1t difficult to de-
stroy them. The foresters say that the
large trees are more than four or five thou
sand years old and that the largest-those
which have passed a height Of three hun
dred feet and diameter Of thirty feet,
may be as old as seven or eight thousand
years They were full grown when Moses
was taken from the bulrushes, when
Aeneas was ''toting'' his infirm father away
from trouble In Troy and were already aged
when the morning stars sang that wonder
full song at Bethlehem.
On the banks Of the Nile visitors are
shown a sycamore under which Joseph and
Mary and the boy Jesus rested while they
were fleeing into Egypt from the wrath OF
Herod In India they show the decrepit
trunk OF an ancient DO tree, under which
Buddha-the Light Of Asia-once preached;
and In the garden of Gethsemane, are
groups of gnarled. ragged and rotten olive
trees, under which our Savior is said to
have wept. Doubt Is cast upon the truth of
these representations. Skeptics assert that