IN CALIFORNIA 97 



scientist who undertook to describe the first col- 

 lected specimen, took it unquestionably for a Helio- 

 tr opium, and so named it. 



In these early days of Spring's progress she drops 

 as she goes, a cloth of gold woven here of suncups 

 and there of Baeria, each with flowers the size of a 

 dime, that always nestle close to earth, but by rea- 

 son of their abundance make a brave showing in 

 spite of their individual tininess. The former is a 

 diurnal species of Oenothera, a genus to which the 

 evening primroses belong; Baeria is a pretty, 

 orange-yellow composite of so delicate a perfume 

 that Titania, if ever she visits these Hesperian 

 shores, must have her fairies bottle it for her 

 handkerchiefs, I think. It is one of the most allur- 

 ing of all the California floral sisterhood, and flows 

 and trickles like a golden stream sometimes for 

 miles, gathering now and again into pools and lakes 

 of sunny color, on foothill slopes and in the valleys, 

 from Oregon to Lower California. And now, too, 

 we shall have our first glimpses of the lilac cups of 

 the mariposa tulips, resting like butterflies upon 

 some rippling lake of wild grasses across which the 

 breeze sweeps. So grasslike are the mariposa 's 

 leaves, that they are all but indistinguishable in 

 such situations and it is easy to imagine the beau- 

 tiful blossoms borne by the grasses themselves. 



