Page:The Tourist's California by Wood, Ruth Kedzie.djvu/228

 190 THE TOURIST'S CALIFORNIA people in its hollow trunk, through its knot-holes a man could crawl without touching his elbows. A tape five times twenty feet long is needed to gir- dle the " Ohio " at its base. One trunk which lies prone requires a tall step-ladder to climb its sides ; before it was felled by the elements it must have reached more than half as high as the clock on the Metropolitan tower. . . . Thus does our puny imagination abase sublim- ity. Many trees have been christened for " great " men. Who so famous as to merit such name- sakes? Their stems taper skyward like fluted columns. Perhaps 100 feet above the ground, branches long and thick as an ordinary hemlock begin to spread laterally from the shaft and lift their plushy foli- age and brilliant cones in pyramidal gradients an- other 200 feet nearer the blue. The oldest giganteas godfathered civilisation. In the days of the prophets they were shimmering their blossoms, everting their seeds, repairing their torn plumage, stretching their great limbs, dominating the forest as now. At first we are stunned by the mere fact of their being. But when we have lingered awhile with these monarchs, we forget their soaring height in remarking their symmetry, their resolute fairness ; their attributes of age and immensity are less