CONTRIBUTIONS TO WESTERN BOTANY NO. t% 105 



branched above. Today very hot and still. Boat due lor Mazaflan today- 

 There is here a Cereus like Emoryi, the same hight, but twice ms slender, 

 with yellow spines. There is ano&a: low one growing in mats, 1-2 feet 

 diameter, the stems are 4-6 inches long. This is a Mamillaria probably. 

 The big-burred pitayia,cardon (Cereus Pringlei) has intermediate forms 

 that are smaller. . The proliferous Opuntia is common, its fruit is almost 

 always smooth and shiny. Tlien there is another, Tuna-like (cultivated), 

 with joints about a foot l<Hig and nearly as wide, with each aureole with 

 stout spines, probably fruit is edible. The real pitayia (of the Mexican5) 

 is a low Cereus, that is, rarely over 8 feet high, with slender stems,, more 

 more of the Jiabit of C. Schottii, but fruit is globular, shiny all over, 

 about 2 inches wide, red, a little depressed-globular, but the fruit I ate 

 at San Antonio ovd and 3-4 inches long, dark-purple, and with black 

 5eeds ^2 mm. long, four times as small as those of the burr-cardon 

 (Cereus Pringlei). Some Mexicans say there is a big cardon with yellow 

 and smooth fruit that stock eat. Saw a few Echinocacti (Falconeri ?). 

 There is a big forest of the Cardon at the salt works at Techilingue bay. 

 ITie formation on the east of La Paz is tilted gently 10-15 degrer.s to the 

 west, apparently close to the sea is seemingly Pleistocene, but above that 

 eastward (below it geologically) is a black and reddish sandstone in 

 immense areas like the Trias of Utah and may be Cretaceoas, bejond 

 that east are the high eruptive mountains, basaltic probably. The vcgeta* 

 tion on the hills is little denser than at Tucson or Victorville, no grass. 

 The higest mountains seem to have no more vegetation on them or, if any, 

 a little less than below. 



Left La |*a2 oa Ac Washington for Mazatlan, and ^zihd all right 

 over a placid sea. The purser says it is 220 miles across and tliat wc 

 will get there at night. Have seen a few birds, but no fi'^h or whales. 

 Now out of sight of land. Boat is making 10 miles an hour, am nor 

 seasick- Day mild and with few fleecy clouds. 



Monday on train bound home out of Mazatlan. Forest still. Saw 

 au Agave Goldmanni. Now I see a red parasite (Txyranthus) on n 

 Bursera, long flowers. Trees covered with Rochclla lichen. Oceans of 

 Leguminosate* Big apple-tree like Bursera but with simple leaves. Nowr 

 tree 20 feet high with big and white floviers like a Comus (Bombax 

 Palmeri ?). Now a small petayia with 4 ribs. Now a bush (Legumi- 

 nous) with long and yellow and erect spikes. Now a lax-leaved Yucca 

 Now we are down to tidewater. Dinner, quite a place. There are thrrf 

 ranges of mountains parallel to the eart of us, 2,000 to 3,000 feet high, 

 and a river 50 feet wide. Amarantus fimbriatus. Now a leguminous 

 »hnib with long and flat branches like a cocoanut leaf Iporaoea pur- 

 purea. Now a tall weed like a Villanova. Now a taU and white-barkci 

 leguminous like a palo verdc and with long and narrow pods. Now a 

 big Aristida-like grass. Cardons still, 20-40 feet hij^. Now white and 

 mirf'^le water lilies. Also Alisma or the like, Cuscuta, Hymenoclea. 

 Vegetation large. Big leaves Leguminous plant with pods. Now an 

 Avavp near Vexans. Cypre.*;s wife trunk 4^ feet high. Purple water 



li'y, Alisma. Some sfgus of rain. Yellow flowere<l small tree. Thou* 



