THREE KINDS OF SEED THAT THE WIND SHAKES FREE
Here are three kinds of seed adapted for dispersal by the shaking action of the wind.
Though comparatively young, these trees—the one Mr. Muir climbed into and its neighbors—were about 100 feet high, and "their lithe, brushy tops were rocking and swirling in wild ecstasy." In its greatest sweeps the top of Muir's tree described an arc of from twenty to thirty degrees, but he felt sure it wouldn't break, and so he proceeded to take in the great storm show.
"Now my eye roved over the piny hills and dales as over fields of waving grain, and felt the light running in ripples across the valleys from ridge to ridge, as the shining foliage was stirred by the waves of air. Oftentimes these waves of reflected light would break up suddenly into a kind of beaten foam and finally disappear on some hillside, like sea waves on a shelving shore."
This was his impression of the forest as a whole, a dark green sea of tossing waves. But if we study trees as long and lovingly as Muir did, we can pick out the different members of the family a mile away—even several miles away—by their gestures, their style of grave and graceful dancing in the wind.
TYPES OF FLYING MACHINE
Here is the type of flying machine that carries men. On the opposite page is the kind that carries the dandelion seeds.