Plants of Santa Clara. 125 
Clara broad-gauge station, amongst cinders, by the side of tracks 
passing in front of the freight house. Seed in quantity I at once 
suspected, and still believe, had been swept from two roofless and 
sideless freight cars, or had fallen from lumber or other goods taken 
therefrom upon this coarse and fine locomotive furnace refuse, as 
the plants were growing along the rails for just the length that two 
such cars would measure, and nowhere else. I advised the exter- 
mination of this visitor to save a neighboring seed farm from inva- 
sion, but, though several attempts have been made to do so, that 
desirable end has not yet been accomplished. 
Another species approaching the above in shape of leaf and gen- 
eral aspect, though reaching a height of not over 30 or 36 inches, 
and apparently -. Hookeriana, has also come into this valley. This 
is an annual plant, gray-leaved and rough-stemmed like F. éenuifo- 
“ia, and a bearer of fruit furnished with flat, thin and broad spines. 
It seems to belong principally along the eastern border and 
southern section of the State. Hereabout, I know of it at but one 
point, which is three miles east on the Berryessa road and opposite 
brick-making and cattle-yards. The latter enclosures I especially 
mention, as they seem to furnish an answer as to how this station 
for the species was established, though it is possible that birds, 
rather than the soiled hairy coats of horned stock, were the convey- 
ors of the seed. The two seaside growers of this genus, though 
never wandering away from the petty hillocks of the beach or the 
higher dunes immediately at their rear, succeed as well on the up- 
_ lands, in irrigated soil, as in their own respective homes. Sheep 
and woolly dogs must frequently pass over these’plants, and, catch- 
ing the spiny fruit in their clothing, carry it miles back to heavier 
soil and higher ground. Why should not such naturally sown seed 
occasionally germinate, and, in favorable situations by perennial 
streams, for instance, or in continuously moist meadowy ground, 
thrive and spread into noticeable plantations? 
One of these species, the very variable /: dipinnatifida, grew for 
two years at least, in the yard of a house I occupied at Santa Cruz; 
and here at Santa Clara the other species, /. Chamzssonis, has for 
three years spread itself attractively over a border’s edge, and, scat- 
tering its fruit, has become the center, each spring, of a gay and 
gray group of its kind. 
During the same visit to the oceanward border of the Golden 
