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Round-about Rambles in Lands of Fact and Fancy, stories by Frank R Stockton |
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Far-Away Forests |
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[Illustration: PINE FOREST.] I have no doubt that you all like to wander in the woods, but suppose we ramble for an hour or two in forests so far away that it is probable none of you have ever seen them. Let us first enter a pine forest. We have plenty of pines in our own country, and it is probable that most of you have walked in the pine woods, on many a summer's day, when the soft carpet of "needles," or "pine-shatters," as some people call them, was so pleasant to the feet, the aromatic perfume of the leaves and trees was so delicious, and everything was so quiet and solemn. But here is a pine forest in the Eastern hemisphere. These woods are vast and lonely. The ground is torn up by torrents, for it is a mountainous district, and the branches have been torn and broken by many a storm. It is not a pleasant place for those who love cheerful scenery, and moreover, it is not so safe to ramble here as in our own woods at home. Companies of bandits inhabit many of these forests, especially those that stretch over the mountainous portions of Italy. It seems strange that in this enlightened era and in one of the civilized countries of Europe, bandits should still exist to terrify the traveller; but so it is. Let us get out of this pine forest, so gloomy and perhaps so dangerous. Here, now, is a very different place. This is a forest in the tropics. You will not be likely to meet with bandits here. In fact, it is very improbable indeed that you will meet with any one. There are vast portions of these woods which have never been trodden by the foot of man, and which you can never see unless you cut your way, hatchet in hand, among the thick undergrowth and the interlacing vines. Here are ferns as large as trees--great masses of flowers that seem as if a whole garden had been emptied down before us--vast wildernesses of green, which we know extend for miles and miles, and which, although apparently so thick and impenetrable, are full of all kinds of life, vegetable and animal. The trees are enormous, but many of them are so covered with vines and creepers that we can scarcely distinguish the massive trunks and luxuriant foliage. Every color is here, rich green, royal purple, red, yellow, lilac, brown, and gray. The vines, which overrun everything, are filled with gorgeous flowers, and hang from the branches in the most graceful forms. Monkeys chatter among the trees, beautiful parrots fly from limb to limb, butterflies of the most gorgeous hues flutter about the grass-tops and the leaves near the ground, and on every log and trunk are myriads of insects, lizards and little living things of endless varieties, all strange and wonderful to us. In some parts of this interminable forest, where the light breaks through the foliage, we see suspended from the trees the wonderful air-plants or orchids. They seem like hanging-baskets of flowers, and are far more beautiful and luxuriant than anything of the kind that we have in our hothouses at home. But we shall not find it easy to walk through all these beauties. As I said before, we shall often be obliged to cut a path with our hatchets, and even then we may be unable to penetrate very far into this jungle of beauties. The natives of these countries, when they are compelled to pass through these dense forests, often take to the small streams and wade along in the water, which is sometimes up to their shoulders, occasionally finding shallower places, or a little space on the banks where they can pick their way along for a few hundred yards before they are obliged to take to the stream again. [Illustration: GIANT TREES OF CALIFORNIA.] Everything is lovely and luxuriant here, but it will not do to stay too long. There are fevers and snakes. Let us now go to the greatest woods in the whole world. I do not mean the most extensive forest, but that one where the trees are the grandest. This is the region where the giant trees of California grow. Nowhere on the face of the earth are there such trees as these. Some of them stand over four hundred feet high, and are thirty feet in diameter! Their age is believed to be about eighteen hundred years. Think of it! They have been growing there during the whole of the Christian era! One of them, the very largest of all, has been lying on the ground for about one hundred and fifty years. When it was standing its diameter was about forty feet. Another trunk, which is lying on the ground, has been hollowed out by fire, and through this great bore or tube a whole company of horsemen has ridden. One of these trees was cut down some years ago by a party of men, who, I think, should have been sent to prison for the deed. It took five men twenty-five days to cut it through with augers and saws, and then they were obliged to use a great wedge and a battering-ram to make it fall. These are the kings of all trees. After such a grand sight, we will not want to see any more trees to-day, and we will leave the forests of Far-away and sit and think of them under our humble grape-vines and honeysuckles. |
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