G THE AiMERICAN BOTANIST 



which is the part used, is mashed and apphed to fresh cuts, 

 whereupon the flow of blood is soon checked. Contemporar}^ 

 with the false-mallow there occurs a plant that is far from be- 

 ing- a like favorite. I refier to the stemless loco-weed (Oxytro- 

 pis Lamhertii). which, however, has wrought but little mis- 

 chief in this vicinity. It is more common in the sandhills than 

 elsewhere. 



In late May and in June the Mariposa lily, one of the love- 

 liest blooms in all the enflowered realm of nature, is abundant 

 upon the sides of the more rugged hills. "Butterfly lily" is an- 

 other very appropriate name that is sometimes applied to it, 

 and its generic appellation, is Calochortus, signifying "beauti- 

 ful herb." In the region of the limestone hills at this season, 

 too, Lithosjycnmnn Uncarifolium^ a homely puccon, is much in 

 evidence, while among the sand-hills tlie hairy gromwell, a 

 closely allied species with most beautiful orange-colored blos- 

 soms, greets the eye everywhere. Poets and theologians no 

 doubt would tell us that that plainer puccoon was suflfered to 

 dv^'ell in the more varied upland country and help in its small 

 way to eke out the number of attractions already there, while 

 the beautiful orange-blossomed species was preordained to 

 grace the dreary wastes of the sand-hills, and cheer the weary 

 traveler on his way. But being neither poet nor teleological 

 theologian, and knowing as I do that variations in plants and 

 animals occur according to the formulas of chance or error, 

 I must consider the contingency of color in large measure, as 

 a mere accident of evolution. 



It is a fundamental fact of botanic lore that all the parts 

 of a flower — pistils, stamens, petals, and sepals — are but modi- 

 fied leaves ; and in the showy Mentzelia that grows near the 

 Bad Lands, we are able, if we examine the blossoms, to find 

 a hint of this truth. Our Mcntzelia has ten handsome petals, 

 and its excedingly numerous stamens, with their thread-like 

 filaments are typical in form. But if we had here in hand a 

 number of specimens of different kinds of MentzcUa from 



