A FAIRY-STOEY TRANSFORMATION. 61 



ness, with clusters of pale gold stamens. Then 

 will stand revealed the " superb mentzelia," a 

 true Cinderella, fit only for ignominious uses in 

 the morning, but a suitable bride for the fairy 

 prince in the evening. 



To look at the wide-stretching table-lands, 

 where, during its season, this fairy-story trans- 

 formation takes place daily, so burned by the 

 sun, and swept by the wind, that no cultivated 

 plant will flourish on it, one would never sus- 

 pect that it is the scene of a brilliant " proces- 

 sion of flowers " from spring to fall. " There is 

 always something going on outdoors worth see- 

 ing," says Charles Dudley Warner, and of no 

 part of the world is this more true than of these 

 apparently desolate plains at the foot of the 

 Rocky Mountains. Rich is the reward of the 

 daily stroller, not only in the inspiration of its 

 pure, bracing air, the songs of its meadow-larks, 

 and the glory of its grand mountain view, but 

 in its charming flower show. 



This begins with the anemone, modest and 

 shy like our own, but three times as big, and 

 well protected from the sharp May breezes by a 

 soft, fluffy silk wrap. Then some day in early 

 June the walker shall note groups of long, 

 sword-shaped leaves, rising in clusters here and 

 there from the ground. He may not handle 

 them with impunity, for they are strong and 



