106 WITH THE FLOWERS AND TREES 



seen it, seemed a flower garden, offered now to the 

 botanist only a dry, withered field (ein durres, aus- 

 gestorbenes Feld). . . . We, however, collected the 

 seeds of many plants and expect to enrich our gar- 

 dens thereby." Among these was our poppy which 

 these botanists found growing in dry sand where 

 San Francisco now stands. 



On negative evidence, therefore, it would appear 

 that even upon its discoverer the golden flower 

 made no particular impression in the field; and 

 doubtless at the late season when the collection was 

 made, only scattering specimens were in bloom. 

 His description of the plant was not published until 

 four years later, in 1820 at Madrid, in the Spaniard 

 Luis Nee's "Horae Physicae"; and the name 

 Eschscholtzia* Calif ornica was given by Chamisso, 

 first, in honor of his companion in labor, "the very 

 skilful, very learned, very amicable Eschscholz, 

 doctor of medicine and equally expert in botany 

 and entomology," and, secondly, in commemoration 

 of the land where the flower was found. From the 

 seeds collected by Chamisso, the flower was intro- 

 duced into European gardens where it has long been 

 an established favorite. Present day botanists 



* But Chamisso's name for the genus lacked the t that somehow 

 has since attached itself to a word which, one would have thought, 

 was already sufficiently wealthy in consonants. 



