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Show THE STONE FOREST The wonders of the earth on which We live, and particularly that portion which we call America, are Intensely Interesting. The "forest turned to stone" In Apache county, Arizona, is ofte of the natural wonders of America. Amer-ica. Congress so concluded, at the same time putting to end the malicious ma-licious acts of those who were hostile to the preservation of its treasures, when in 1906 It passed "An act for the preservation of American antiquities," antiqui-ties," President Roosevelt placed the forest under the protection of the government, gov-ernment, designating it "The Petrified Forest National monument" for the perpetual enjoyment of the people. Here, at an elevation of about one mile above sea level, lying In the open and scattered over thousands of acres and in all conceivable positions, is a profusion of millions of tons of fallen trees turned to stone agate, jasper, opal "the most brilliant aggregation of jewels on the globe." The dominating dominat-ing feature Is a natural bridge formed by a petrified trunk of agate and Jasper Jas-per which spans a 60-foot-wlde canyon. How come? The solution of that question has puzzled the greatest students stu-dents of the structure of our earth, the physical changes which it has undergone, un-dergone, and the causes which have operated to produce these changes. The general supposition seems to be that In time far beyond the reach of record a million or more years ago, a giant woodland flourished here. Some great catastrophe, most likely an earthquake, mowed It down and, In the reshaping of the earth's crust, aa inland lake or sea was formed above this sunken forest. Seepage from springs of salt, sulphur and other mineral min-eral content penetrated every fiber of this wood the prolonged period of saturation gradually pickling the wood to stone. At length, another age was ushered In. An upheaval as tremendous as It was mysterious awakened this sleeping, sleep-ing, this forgotten forest and It was belched up to the top of the earth again, to a place in the Arizona sun. There are three divisions of this forest. The first, famous for Its bright colors, is six miles from Adamana ; the second Is two and one-half miles farther on. Here the trees are largely large-ly intact, many of them highly colored; col-ored; the third is ten and one-half miles farther southwest and by reason of the striking colors has earned locally lo-cally tiie name of Rainbow forest. |