fi 



22 THE AMERICAN BOTANIST, 



it if one cannot admire. N. Bigelovii is a visced 111 smell- 

 ing herb growing in waste places near the dry creek bed 

 and even occasionally on the sides of the hills The 

 flowers are white with an inch long tube and rotate 

 corolla an inch in diameter. 



One of the most curious of our native plants {sLycium 

 Caliibrnicum. It looks like anything but a Solatium for 

 it is a thorny, low-growang bush with branches and long 

 slender spines so closely interlaced as to form an impene- 

 trable thicket. Most of the j^ear this bush is leafless and 

 appears to be dead, and it is my opinion that it does con- 

 tinue year after year in this nude state. 



But one spring I found a bush with a few leaves and 

 flowers; leaves fleshy and about the size and shape of a 

 grain of wheat, flowers small, white with four lobes to the 

 rotate corolla instead of five. It grows on the edge of the 

 cliff overhanging the sea, and I have never seen it else- 

 w^here. 



Last and least is Petunia parviflora. I hacf been told 

 to watch for this wee flower but had no idea w^here to 

 look or in w^hat season. One day in late summer last 

 year I sat for a w^hole afternoon on the dry and 3'ellow 

 grass under an elder tree sketching. It was in a rather 

 wide part of a canon and near a small pond, yet so dry 

 that even the pond had dried up. It was only w^hen I was 

 gathering up my things to go home that I saw close to the 

 earth a tiny plant wath crimson flowers. I hastily gath- 

 ered a handful as it was nearly night, and not until next 

 day gave them another look. Then they were badl}'" 

 withered but patience was rewarded prcsenth' in my dis- 

 covering I had not one but two rare jDlants : Petunia par- 

 viflora and Verbena bracteosa. The blossoms were 

 minute and neither plant had branches over three inches 

 long, both growing prostrate. 



Orange, California, 



