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olume XII . NroYember?December, 1910 Number 6 TH-E ,YELLOW PIl?135, OF .MF_?A DEL ,AGUA DE L-A YEGU. A By I*LOR.ENCI? MERRIAM BAILEY WITH Oli']? PHOTO "?, 1 ONE of the 'mesas we had-seen so far between the Staked Plains and the i '-? Rocky Mountains had had any trees higher than the orchard-like junipers and nut pines; they 'had all' belonged'to the arid juniper zone, and all had the same set of: bi?ds, mammals and plants. '. We' had' been working in this juuiper zone in' New Mexico not only thru most of' this field season but thru most of the previous' season, with occasional'dips down into the .warmer zone of the mesquite country, so that our .appetites for big trees and mountains had grown into a veri- table hunger. 'Now as- we approaeht'Mesa'del Agua de la' Yegua, named apparently for some 1oc?'11y' historic springs used for watering a band of mares, its western' fringe of trees' lookt surprizingly high to us, and the more .we lookt, straining our eyes with eager hungry gaze, the 'higher they seemed,' the longer stretcht the bare trunks 'below the'bushy tops, and the more excited we got. "Yellow:pines !" was at last' pronounced, conclusively. What a thrill it gave us and-what 'a flood of' rich associations the name brought us ! Had we at last come to something 'higher than a juniper? 'Should we finally, to express our enthu- siasm in working terms, get above' the lowtrees of the aridSonoran zone into the Transition zone'y?tlow pines-with lheir old familiar birds and- mammals ? Haunted by visions of'New 'Mexico's 'noble coniferous-forests, it had seemed as if-we would -never,get' above the' Upper Sonoran orchards. "Transition! Transition!" we repeated to ourselves, forthe'word was 'rich 'in memories of noble-boled, fragrant pine woods ' and sweet-voiced birds. It was too good' to be truemI lookt at the trees ,fearful lest' their imagined 'hight dwarf under my gaze. Still, in spite of my ?donts, we. were working' west toward the Rocky-Mountains and' this section of the plateau rose one'thousand feet'from .the-plains, so it>might wel} reach into the yellow pines. The thought opened' a beatttifu} vistarowe were really approaching the mountains at' last !