soil happens to be composed of the finer
qualities of glacial detritus and the water is not in excess, the
nearest approach is made by the vegetation to that of the lake-meadow.
But where, as is more commonly the case, the soil is coarse and
bouldery, the vegetation is correspondingly rank. Tall, wide-leaved
grasses take their places along the sides, and rushes and nodding
carices in the wetter portions, mingled with the most beautiful and
imposing flowers,--orange lilies and larkspurs seven or eight feet high,
lupines, senecios, aliums, painted-cups, many species of mimulus and
pentstemon, the ample boat-leaved _veratrum alba_, and the
magnificent alpine columbine, with spurs an inch and a half long. At an
elevation of from seven to nine thousand feet showy flowers frequently
form the bulk of the vegetation; then the hanging meadows become hanging
gardens.

In rare instances we find an alpine basin the bottom of which is a
perfect meadow, and the sides nearly all the way round, rising in gentle
curves, are covered with moraine soil, which, being saturated with
melting snow from encircling fountains, gives rise to an almost
continuous girdle of down-curving meadow vegetation that blends
gracefully into the level meadow at the bottom, thus forming a grand,
smooth, soft, meadow-lined mountain nest. It is in meadows of this sort
that the mountain beaver (_Haplodon_) loves to make his home,
excavating snug chambers beneath the sod, digging canals, turning the
underground waters from channel to channel to suit his convenience, and
feeding the vegetation.

Another kind of meadow or bog occurs on densely timbered hillsides where
small perennial streams have been dammed at short intervals by fallen
trees. Still another kind is found hanging down smooth, flat precipices,
while corresponding leaning meadows rise to meet them.

There are also three kinds of small pot-hole meadows one of which is
found along the banks of the main streams, another on the summits of
rocky ridges, and the third on glacier pavements, all of them
interesting in origin and brimful of plant beauty.

CHAPTER VIII

THE FORESTS

The coniferous forests of the Sierra are the grandest and most beautiful
in the world, and grow in a delightful climate on the most interesting
and accessible of mountain-ranges, yet strange to say they are not well
known. More than sixty years ago David Douglas, an enthusiastic botanist
and tree lover, wandered alon