A tree usually 40—100 feet high with a trunk 1—5 feet in diameter, short crowded tough branches, usually slightly pendulous near the base and forming dense spire-like slender heads; bark rough on the older trees, with thick, appressed, cinnamon-red scales; leaves pale blue-green flat, 1—1¾ inches long on the lower branches, rounded or notched at the apex; on the upper branches thickened, not more than ½ an inch long, flattened and closely appressed with long rigid points; cones, oblong-cylindric, rounded, truncate or depressed at the narrowed apex, dark purple and soft-hairy, 1½—4 inches long with scales gradually narrowed from the broad rounded apex to the base, about 3 times as long as the bracts. This tree the Balsam of the region is found throughout on the higher mountain slopes and summits, frequently forming the timber line in which case it is shrub-like and stunted. [Sidenote: =Pseudotsuga mucronata= (Raf.) Sudw. _Douglas Spruce, Red Fir._] A magnificent tree 80—100 feet high, with a trunk 2—3 feet in diameter, or frequently larger, with slender crowded branches and long pendulous lateral ones forming, while the tree is young, an open pyramid, soon deciduous from the trees crowded in the forest and leaving the bare trunk naked for ⅔ of its height and surmounted by a comparatively small, narrow head; bark on the young trees, smooth, dark gray-brown and lustrous, on the old trunks several inches thick, divided into oblong plates broken into irregularly connected ridges; leaves crowded, yellowish-green, straight or slightly curved, narrow, ¾—1¼ inches long, obtuse or acute at the apex; cones pendent on long stout stems, 2—4¼ inches long, with thin slightly concave scales; bracts often extending half an inch beyond the scales. [Illustration: Abies lasiocarpa (Hook.) Nutt. (⅓ Nat.) Balsam Fir.] [Illustration: Pseudotsuga mucronata (Raf.) Sudw. (¼ Nat.) Douglas Fir.] Throughout the Rockies in the lower wooded valleys, the handsomest tree of this section especially when young, now rather rare in the mature state along the line of the railway, but may be so seen to perfection in the Yoho and some of the other outlying valleys. [Sidenote: =Tsuga heterophylla= (Raf.) Sarg. _Western Hemlock._] A tree frequently 200 feet high, with a trunk 6—10 feet in diameter, with short slender usually pendulous branches forming a narrow pyramidal head; bark orange-brown, thin when young, an inch or more thick on mature trees and divided into broad flat ridges; leaves flat, dark green and lustrous on the upper surface, marked below by broad white bands; cones sessile, oblong or oval, ¾—1 inch long with few yellowish-brown oblong scales abruptly contracted at the middle and purplish toward the base. Abundant throughout the Selkirks. [Sidenote: =Tsuga Mertensiana= (Bong.) Carr. _Mountain Hemlock._]