SO THE AMERICAN BOTANIST 



at their best at the edges of the melting" drifts. Blooming in 

 May at timberline, they are found successively higher as the 

 season advances and the snowline ascends, until August finds 

 them brightening the otherwise barren soil of the highest, 

 coldest chasms. They make the season's growth after flower- 

 ing and then curl up the rudimentary next year's stem and 

 blossom in the heart of a compact little ball of leaves to with- 

 stand the long dry time. If August showers follow a July 

 drought, many of them will bloom again, for the first touch 

 of water, coupled with warm sunshine, causes the stem to 

 elongate and the blossom to develop with almost incredible 

 rapidity. For this reason, Summer comes suddenly to these 

 high places. The meadows are frozen and dreary for months ; 

 then, some day early in June, water from melting snow 

 dampens them, the next they are green with sprouting grass 

 and within a week they are glowing and fairly pulsating with 

 the "festival of breaking bud and scented breath." 



"A thousand odors rise, 

 Breathed up from blossoms of a thousand dyes." 



for nearly all of these plants are exceedingly odorful, most 

 of them pleasantly so. The forget-me-not's breath resembles 

 but excels the heliotrope's perfume ; and so numerous are 

 these tiny blue flowers that the wind bears their fragrance fr kt 

 miles across the valleys. Ginger-root, sweet androsace, alpine 

 clover, Lloydia and dozens of others have more elusive but 

 no less charming odors. However, the ill-smelling primrose 

 does not belie its name and the foliage of the polemonium is 

 anything but sweet-smelling. 



All the plants that glorify the alpine meadows have had 

 to develop some scheme to protect themselves from the full 

 effects of the furious chilling and drying winds that blow more 

 or less constantly around all high peaks. These continuous 

 winds and the brilliant sunlight, so intense through the thin 

 air, rapidly dry out the thawed surface of the porous soil on 



