118 WITH THE FLOWERS AND TREES 



with flowers like flames of fire, that bloom often on 

 stalks from which the suns of August have scorched 

 every leaf. But the glory of the chaparral flowers 

 at least in the southern half of California is a 

 certain yucca (Y. Whipplei), which in May and 

 June lifts its tall, slender panicles on the dry hill- 

 sides like great exclamation points. The plant it- 

 self is a stemless mass of stiletto-like leaves about 

 two feet long, which radiate fiercely in all direc- 

 tions forming an unapproachable hemisphere squat 

 upon the ground. From the midst of this vege- 

 table hedgehog the flower-stalk rises like a spire to 

 a height of ten, twelve or fifteen feet, breaking 

 throughout half its upper length into a myriad 

 creamy cups of solid bloom. The Coahuilla Indians, 

 with utilitarian thrift, boiled these waxen blossoms 

 and ate them. Were poets made of that they feed 

 on, what rhapsodies and lyrics might not a dinner 

 of yucca flowers inspire ! Town folk who go to the 

 hills for an outing bring hundreds of these titanic 

 yucca bouquets back with them, severed at the base 

 of the stalk, and borne on their shoulders or in car- 

 riages or automobiles, to be stood in some corner 

 at home where they remain fresh for days. The 

 plant dies after flowering, but offsets from the old 

 root continue the generation. Miss Parsons in her 

 excellent manual, "The Wild Flowers of Calif or- 



