growth of moss succeeds: a
little peat-bed forms itself underneath: generations after generations
of mosses and watery plants succeed one another; and in time the
prostrate trunk is entirely buried under a bright-green bed, soft as
down, but treacherous to the foot as a quicksand. Often may the wanderer
amid these wild glades think to throw himself on one of these inviting
couches; and, bounding on to it, he sinks five or six feet through moss
and weed and dirty peat, till his descent is stopped by the skeleton of
the vast tree that lies beneath. Wild flowers grow all around: and every
spot of ground that will produce them is covered in the summer season
with the tempting little red strawberry, or the wild raspberry, or the
blushing rose. Above all, still keep peering, in solemn and interminable
array, the vast monarchs of the wood, the stately and elegant
silver-firs.

When you attempt to leave the forests and advance towards the upper
grounds, you commonly find yourself stopped by a precipitous wall of
basaltic columns, ranging from sixty to seventy feet in height in one
unbroken shaft, and forming a vast barrier for miles and miles in
length. In some places, these gray basaltic walls come circling round,
and constitute an immense natural theatre, sombre and grand as the
forest itself. No sound is there heard save the dashing of a distant
cascade, or the wind in deep symphony rushing through the slow-waving
tops of the trees. Below is a carpet of the most lively green,
variegated with turfs of wild flowers and fruits--one of nature's
secret, yet choicest gardens. Through the midst trickles a silvery
stream, coming you know not whence, but musical in its course, and soon
losing itself in the thick underwood that borders the spot all around.
Such is the Salle de Mirabeau--one of the loveliest of the many lovely
hiding-places of these sublime forests.

The feathered tenants of these woods are mostly birds of prey, or at all
events such as the raven, the jay, the pie, and others which can either
defend themselves against, or escape from, the falcons that consider
these solitudes as their own especial domains. The voices of few
singing-birds are to be heard; they have taken refuge nearer the
habitations of man: but the hooting of the owl, the beating of the
woodpecker, and the screaming of kites and hawks, are all the living
sounds that proceed here from the air. Red-deer, wolves, wild-boars,
roebucks, and foxes, are the