32 WITH THE FLOWERS AND TREES 



and no documentary record of its advent has as yet 

 been unearthed. It is found wild in the sub-tropical 

 regions of Peru and adjacent countries of South 

 America, and Mr. Chas. F. Lummis, well known 

 authority on all matters pertaining to the South- 

 west, tells me that Don Antonio de Mendoza, the 

 first Spanish viceroy of Peru, sent the tree up to 

 Mexico about the year 1540. Thence it was intro- 

 duced into Europe under the name of Peruvian mas- 

 tic or mulli tree, and was growing in many Euro- 

 pean gardens before the sixteenth century was out. 

 Ever since its introduction into Mexico it has been 

 popular as a shade tree there, and has spread to 

 such an extent as to make even our veteran botanist, 

 Dr. Asa Gray, question if it was not indigenous in 

 that country. It seems reasonable to believe that 

 an ornamental tree so well distributed throughout 

 Spanish-speaking countries, valued for its shade 

 and known to be of quick growth, should have been 

 introduced by the Franciscan Missionaries into 

 California to provide shade around such of their 

 newly founded establishments as needed it. The 

 direct evidence of this is wanting, but Spanish-Cali- 

 fornians will assure you that such was the fact. 

 There is at the Mission San Luis Bey, near Ocean- 

 side in San Diego county, a very large specimen, 

 which local tradition credits with being the first of 



