Summering in the Sierra. The Giant Forests of the Kaweah. Something about the 1875 Sequoia Gigantea of the South Fork of King\u27s River-Measurements of Largest Trees by John Muir. (Special Correspondence of the Bulletin.) Pluno [Plano], Cal., October...

.3 IN THE SIERRA. The Gia&t osgsts of the Saweah. ah . ScmethiER obont ttio Soanola Gisaatea of tfce Soutli Fork* of K.ins\u279 JSiver—JJIeasarements of Largest \u27Trees by John. Muip. [SPECIAL C032ESPONDEJC3 OF THE BULLETIN.] Pit so, Cal, October 19,18T5. The motto, Where there isn\u27t a way, make way slips lightly over the tongue of teacher or sckolar where no way is rueded.but to the traveler in these mountain woods t is soon loaded with meaning. There are ways aa:oss the range, old ways graded by glaciers and followed by men and bears, but net a single way, natural or artificial, has yet ..been constructed along the range; and the traveler who win thus move in. a direction at right angles to the course of the ancient ice rivers must make a way across canons and ridges laid side by side in endless succession, and all roughened with gorges, gulches, landslips, precipices, and stubborn chaparral almost impenetrable to wolves and bears. Such is the region in which I have been making ways during the last month in pursuit of sequoia gigantae. My own ways are easily mad?, for my mountaineering has hereto- \u27 fore been slmost wholly accomplished on foot, carrying a minimum cf every necessary, and lying down by any ssrearoside whenever overtaken by weariness and night. But on tals occasion 1 hav been prevailed upon to take a tough, browumule to carry a pair of blankets and saddle-bags; and many a time while the little hybrid was wedged fast in the rocks, or was struggling out of sight in a wilderness of thorny bushes I have wished myself once mors wholly free, notwithstanding the hunger days and cold nights that would fllow. XODIFIED OPINIONS. la my last, written from Fresno Grove, 1 noticed the prevailing notion concerning the rapid decadence of ourrnanasotu tree a species, and I am now sappy -33 ad,_thac in tracing the belt from north to south, all the phenomenon bearing upon tne question that I have thm far observed, gois to show that the dominion ol s.quoia gigautea, us King of the Sierra foreits !S aot yet passing away, nor\u27.are the forces that are to effect Its extinction ac all visible. .No tree in the woods seems more firmly established, or more sately settled down in accordance with climate isod soil. The farther south I go the thrit\u27ier and more numerous they become, aad here on tne upper waters of the Kaweah, instead of a few isolated groves hidden awaj among the sugar pines, they fill the woods, growing on solid ledges, along water-i\u27.mrse, in the deep moist sou ot meadows, and upon avilancbe and glacier debris, with a multitude of secdla gs ana saplings crowding around the aged and the dying, ready to take their places. A LOUG TKAMP. I Going southward from Fresno, not a single sequoia i is found until we reach Dinky Creek, a tributary of I the Nona Fork of King\u27s river. Here is a small grove of about two. hundred trees growing upon coarse fliod soil. The largest specimen measures thiriy-tw feet in diameter, four feet above the ground. This Utile isolated grove was discovered a few yeas ago oy a coup:e of bear huuters, but ou account oi its remoteness from traveled roads and trails is hidly known. I spent two weeks among the canyons Less than a mile rrom the southern extremity of this forest we enter the so-called King\u27s river Grove which extend southward to the summit of the Kav7eah c, ivide. Descending the rugged south slopes of this divide we at once find ourselves in forests that are still more perfectly ruled by King Sequoia. Immediately to the. south of Hyde\u27s mill the mountain crest is crowned with a close continuous growth of the finest big trees 1 had ever seen. Their noble forms exquisitely outlined on the blue sky, while all the slopes leading from the very bottom of the canyon are densely forested with the same exuberant growih. The finely curved, dome-:iks summits of almost everj tree are seen rising regularly above one. another in raest imposing melesty. Beyond this first TIaweaS forest we descend into what is called Rnwood Canyon, whose slopes upon both sides are densely timbered with sequoia, while the noble sugar- tiine and fir are hushed and hidden as if not one were present. Between Kedwood Canyon aud the giant forest there are numerous ridges and hollows subordinate to the niau canyous of tns Nona nd Middle Forks, each of which bears a portion of tie more or lets continuous belt as It sire:cues ineefinilely uoa\u27tiwarrt, waving aad wrink- oa-in. Beyond \u27.his lagged oelr, up n\u27the broal d- vide separating Marble ireefcfram tne Middle Fork, we fl\u27 d the Giant Forest extending from the granite headlands, overlooking the hot foot-aiils back to within a few miles of cool glaciir fountains, a distance tf six or seven miles. The width of the forest varies from oae to two or three miles, and the height above sea level from 5,096 to nearly 8,00* feet. It was nearr, sundown when I entered this glorious mountain wilderness, and I wandered oa through the deep shadowy aisles, wholly dissolved la the strange benu- ty, as if new arrived Irom the other world. No amount of fatniuar omrimiiton with tne small companies of trees that occur in Calaveras and Tuolumne counties can yield aaytiun? more than feeble hints.of the sublimity of this grand sequoia realm, CAMPING IN THE GROVE—A BEAUTIFUL SPOT. I chose a camping ground on the edge of a meadow commanding fine views of the trees as they approach the opening. Their long ranks, clearly outlined against the starry sky, was the grandest night scene I ever beheld in the range. A few sugar pines and silver liis occur here and there, bnt are so hushed and over-shadowed they exert but little influence aDd seem like slender grasses growing amid staiks of Indian corn. In the morning, leaving my jaded mule on the meadow, I sauntered free in tins solemn wilderness. Go where I would, sequoia ruled supreme. Trees of every age and size covered the craggiest ridges as well as the fertile, deey-soiled slopes, and planted their colossal shafts alcng every brook and along the margins of spongy bosis and meadows. Never before had I beheld a mountain meadow environed with sequoias. Here were a sei ies of meadows laid transversely upon the very susamit of the main divide as if for ornament, every one of which were tuns imbedded in the desp mammoth forest, their smooth emerald bosoms kept i bright by a network of rills and by floods or sunshine . poured through the lofty forest aisles. Eesting awhile on the margin of the most oeaut\u27ful of these, my eye soon wandered from the colossal trees to the autumn- tinted willows and huckleberry thickets, aud I longed to carry awsy their divine colors in a picture. Keith and his paints came to mind, and I would fain have gone far to fetch hisa. No forest picture could equal this. There lay the tranquil sheet of meadow, half a mile long, basking in mellow autumn light, its blnshy grasses colored brown and yellow and clear emerald green; its smooth surface picturesquely interrupted with patches of vaccinram, colored red and crimson. Around the margin a fringe of oranee, willow and azalea, with scarlet patches of cornel; then the incompaiarable walls of verdure variously shaded and tinted, dark green of the young aniry trees, the brown and yellow shadings of the old, aiid their majestic cinnamon-colored trunks in long perspective exquisitively wreathed with small green sprays, and many an aged storm-scarred tree with hege angular arms outspread, overgrown with yel low licaen and surrounded with trees of faultless taper, i whose smooth domes seemed to want not a single leaf in their wondrous perfection, while eveiy color j seemed steadily to increase in beauty beneath the lavish sunbeams, and every tree seemed hushed, as if conscious of the presence of their Maker. SIZE OF TKEES. Although the area covered with the species increases rapidly towards the south, there is no corresponding difference with regard to size. The average size of full-grown specimens wherever I have oeen is about 20 feet m diameter and 250 feet high. Trees 25 feet in diasaeter are not rare and a good many aoproach 300 feet In neight. Oscasioaally one meets a tree SO feat in diameter, and very rarely one that is still larger. Thus it will appear tteat, as far as size is concerned, the Calaveras and Mariposa trees r.val tfeose of Kind\u27s river and the Kaweath, though far behind in other respects. I have heard vague tiding of the largest tree iu every forest and grove, bnt have not yet found it; 40 feet seems the favorite diameter, and this size is maintained among hunters and mountaineers with remarkable constancy. Everybody one meets has heard of this tree, and knows nearly where it is, but none exactly. It is always ahead. At present it is situated, according to ! the latest accounts, upon a steep declivity ou the north aide of the South Fork of Tule river. One man has been within a mile of it. Another has seen it. but did not measure it, etc. Fortunately, the mere size of the one biggest of the bin is of little consequence. The largest measut ed by me is a stump 80 or 90 leet high, siiuated on the south side of the Middle Fork of Kind\u27s river. At a height of 4 feet above the ground it is 85 teet 8 inches inside the bark, ami a plank this | wide could be obtained from it of solid wood, without ; a decayed fibre. HASP WORK AHEAD. How much further the sequoia belt extends in this direction, is a question I lope to settle s.me time before the comiogon or winter stortns; but there is ha/d mountaineering aneact, standing here on tne canon- brink oi this middle fork of the Kaweab, I see long ranks of roctry headlands stretching far into the smoky distance, and plunging down vaguely into profound canon deotlis; bat I can climb and cross them ail, and ford every river. I will make a way, aud love of King j. Sequoia will make all the labor light. 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