They were all thickly branched spruce trees capable of concealing the coveted cache.

Jamie was puzzled, and every moment it was growing darker.

He looked up into the branches of one and then another, hoping to see a bag suspended from a limb, but if a bag were there it blended so completely with the foliage that even its outlines were not revealed.
"I'll have to climb un all," said Jamie finally, "and I'll have to be spry about un too or 'twill be fair dark before I gets to climb the last of un." For his first effort he chose a tree three paces beyond the birch and in a line with the rock.

He had no difficulty in shinning up the trunk until he reached a lower limb, and then he quite easily drew himself up.
Climbing through the thick screen of branches he looked eagerly for the coveted hidden mystery, not stopping until he was well into the tree top and had made quite certain that no cache was hidden there.
Then, as he looked up toward the sky, he felt a snowflake on his face.
"Snowin'!" he exclaimed.

"I'll have to be hurryin' now.