Few beings have lived to see a 500-year sweep of history at a time of such unprecedented change. This is the remarkable biography of a noble Scots pine tree—ancient, gnarled, and weather worn. It stands in the Scottish Highlands, exactly where it landed as a tiny seed some five centuries ago, and where it greeted a young Mary, Queen of Scots, who was then just a child herself. It becomes the heart of a magnificent highland wilderness, home to eagles, wolves, strutting capercaillies, and feisty red squirrels.