BOTANY. 91 



CHAPTER y. 



BOTANY. 



§ 64. Peculiar Fauna and Flora, — California lias a botany- 

 arid zoology of her own. Her indigenous plants and animals 

 are peculiar to her soil. Her plants, her quadrupeds, her birds, 

 and her lishes, are diiierent from those of other countries. The 

 Californian vulture is, next to the condor of South America, 

 the largest bird that flies ; and he might easily migrate to other 

 parts of the continent, but he makes his home only in tliis 

 state, and is certainly never seen east of the Rocky Mountains. 

 The grizzly bear might travel almost as well, but he is found 

 only in California and Oregon. The Californian deer is differ- 

 ent from that of Virginia in horns, teeth, feet, color, and size. 

 The bird known as the roadrunner or paisano might fly to all 

 parts of the continent, but is found only west of the Sierra 

 Nevada. There is a blue-jay here, but it differs from the bird 

 known to the New-Englanders as the blue-jay. The robin of 

 New England difl'ers from the robin of Old England, and the 

 Californian robin differs from both. The sturgeon of the San 

 Francisco market are not the same with those eaten in New 

 York ; and one species found in California is not found in a 

 state so near as Oregon. Our trees are like, and yet are un- 

 like, those of the Atlantic states and Europe. We have oak 

 juid pine, spruce, sycamore, and horse-chestnut trees, and yet 

 any observant man sees at a glance that they differ in many 

 impoitant particulars from the trees known by those names 

 elsewhere. California, with a little of the country adjacent, is 

 a distinct botanical district. Her vegetation was first pro- 



