THE YUCCEAE. 121 
The trunks of the species of Yucca, Clistoyucca and 
Samuela are occasionally used for palisade construction, 
and in the Carneros pass I have seen houses built almost. 
entirely of material obtained from S. Carnerosana,— the 
walls of palisade-like trunks set on end, and the roof 
thatched with the leaves. Attempts have been made to use 
the fiber of Clistoyucca for paper-pulp,* of which a fair 
grade can be made notwithstanding the gumminess of the 
tissues; and the trunks have sometimes been turned into 
coarse veneers for wrapping bottles, etc., as is commonly 
done with soft dicotyledonous woods like the cottonwood. 
The group generally seems to possess the saponifying 
properties of the Agaves, so that the stems and root stocks 
are not infrequently used as amoles,f and a considerable. 
quantity of vegetable soap is claimed to be made from Y. 
baccata, Y. glauca, and, judging from illustrations in ad- 
vertising matter, Y. radiosa. 
Notwithstanding their stiff-pointed leaves, the species 
which grow in the southwestern grazing country are attract- 
ive to cattle in the flowering season, and the animals often 
display some dexterity and no little courage in riding down 
the smaller trees or otherwise getting at their succulent. 
flower-clusters, which are further gathered and carried in to 
be fed to sheep and other animals in some cases, as, for 
instance, in the Carneros pass, where I have seen large 
cart loads of the great panicles of Samuela Carnerosana 
being taken to the hamlet for this purpose. In their early 
stages, too, the inflorescence of Yucca, Hesperoyucca and 
Samuela is said to be either boiled or roasted and used 
for human food or even eaten raw.t Like the crowns of 
** sotol’’ (Dasylirion), the nearly fiberless trunks of the 
southern Samuela are decorticated or split open so that they 
can be eaten by stock. 
* Palmer, 7. c.— Shinn, Amer. Agriculturist. 1891: 689. — Land of 
Sunshine. 10:1, and advertisement. 
t See Palmer, J. c. 
t See —— l. c. — The Garden. 24; 104, — from N. Y. Tribune. 
