Hunting in Many Lands 



the desert, we met beds of conglomerate and 

 trachyte, and mountains covered with sHde- 

 rock, ringing flint-like clinkers from some 

 great volcanic furnace. But doubtless some 

 accurate and industrious German has de- 

 scribed all this, in a work on the geology of 

 the peninsula, and to that valuable treatise 

 I will refer you for further facts. 



The vegetation had somewhat changed. 

 There were more cactuses, particularly the 

 fleshy kind called venaga, though I noticed 

 with surprise the absence of the great fruit- 

 bearing cactuses, the saguarro and pitaya, all 

 along our route. The Spanish daggers were 

 very numerous, as were also mescal plants, 

 both of these forming veritable thickets in 

 places. 



The venaga cactus is similar to the bis- 

 naga, found in other parts of Mexico, except 

 in the disposition and curvature of the thorns. 

 They are stumpy plants, growing from a foot 

 to three feet or so in height, and a foot or 

 more in diameter, like a thickset post. Those 

 of us who delighted in Mayne Reid's " Boy 

 Hunters" will remember how the adventurous 

 young men saved themselves from dying of 

 thirst by laying open these succulent cactuses 



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