The mountains of California . stes them, cut-ting gaps, disintegrating boulders, and carryingaway their decaying material into new formations,until at length they are no longer recognizable byany save students, who trace their transitional formsdown from the fresh moraines still in process of for-mation, through those that are more and more an-cient, and more and more obscured by vegetationand all kinds of post-glacial weathering. Had the ice-sheet that once covered all the rangebeen melted simultaneously from the foot-hills tothe summits, the flanks would, of course, have beenleft almost bare
The mountains of California . stes them, cut-ting gaps, disintegrating boulders, and carryingaway their decaying material into new formations,until at length they are no longer recognizable byany save students, who trace their transitional formsdown from the fresh moraines still in process of for-mation, through those that are more and more an-cient, and more and more obscured by vegetationand all kinds of post-glacial weathering. Had the ice-sheet that once covered all the rangebeen melted simultaneously from the foot-hills tothe summits, the flanks would, of course, have beenleft almost bare of soil, and these noble forestswould be wanting. Many groves and thickets wouldundoubtedly have grown up on lake and avalanchebeds, and many a fair flower and shrub would havefound food and a dwelling-place in weathered nooks THE FOKESTS 145 and crevices, but the Sierra as a whole would havebeen a bare, rocky desert. It appears, therefore, that the Sierra forests ingeneral indicate the extent and positions of the an- r tn O. Mi ^?^^^
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Keywords: ., bookcentury1800, bookdecade1890, booksubjectcaliforniadescriptio
