I3'6 Audubon's Western Journal 



prominent portion. One tree we saw had a large 

 fruit five or six inches long, hanging like a pear; 

 it contained seed, laid in like those of the milk- 

 weed, and we were told the cotton-like substance 

 which enclosed the seeds was used for candlewick. 

 Here we saw the first large cacti I had seen of the 

 cylindrical form; some of them are apparently 

 forty feet high. If in a shaded situation, they 

 have only one or two shoots, while others in open 

 ground have perhaps fifty, but smaller and less 

 luxuriant, being only six or eight inches in diam- 

 eter, instead of four or more. 



August Ilth. Coming down the creek our 

 second day's descent we opened into a wide arroyo 

 of sometimes two hundred yards, with water 

 running through it, and again the water disap- 

 peared and the dry parched bottom sent up a heat 

 such as I do not recollect having ever felt before. 

 I saw the men fag, get down and tumble on the 

 grass at the sides, whenever a shady spot could 

 be found, and the poor mules seemed completely 

 exhausted. Many of us became sick at our 

 stomachs from the effects of the intense contrast 

 in temperature, for we had left an atmosphere 

 like that of Maine, for the tropics. We saw a 

 storm coming up and for once wished it to hasten; 

 but we had no rain, only a gust of its cooling 

 breeze, and we gladly left our trying surroundings 

 for a delightful shade and green grass. 



