4 THE AMERICAN BOTANIST 



appears one of this family called the Tomnsendia, a humble 

 dweller next to the soil where its rather sizeable heads are con- 

 spicuous, though it has no stem to speak of. Its success in life 

 is owing to its geetting out betimes, before the rush and con- 

 flict that ensue when the hosts of the summer plants arrive. 



The early spring plants of the arid or semi-arid regions 

 have, many of them, acquired this beneficial habit of clinging 

 close to the surface of the soil, thus obtaining partial shelter 

 from the searching winds. The smoothish yellow violet 

 {Viola scabrinscula) is one such, and the Phlox Douglasii. 

 which, on elevated ridges, smiles up at the traveler from the 

 grassy dimples of the ground, is another. 



Early in April, or sooner, is seen growing among the hills 

 the pasque-flower {Pulsatilla hirsutissinia) . It prefers moist 

 ravines, and is abundant in the shadow of the pines. A little 

 while after this plant has first come into bloom, the leaves of 

 various perennial species, anxious to greet the spring, show 

 themselves above the surface of the ground. We now recog- 

 nize the first foliage of vervains, nettles, pentstemons, arte- 

 misia, Leucocrinitm, squaw-weeds, and divers others, that in 

 a short time will appear in all their glory. 



Next in spring blooms Leucocrinuni nwntanum — the 

 "little white lily" or "May flower" — bestudding the prairies 

 with its countless stars. By May 25 it has disappeared almost 

 entirely from the open plains, but along fences in sheltered, 

 cool nooks, it still tarries, now and then, as vanquished races 

 sometimes linger for ages in localities where their conquerors 

 come not. About May 20, Zygadenus veneriosns, a "camas," 

 takes the place of Leucocrinum as the most conspicuous vege- 

 table of the plains. A few years ago an Indian child of the 

 reservation was fatally iX)isoned from eating of the bulbs of 

 this plant, and the red men, easily awed in the presence of any- 

 thing whose action or properties they cannot understand, are 

 said to call the Zygadenus "peji wakan," or "mystery-grass." 



When Mav is well advanced there is an abundance of 



