Some Wild Flowers ofCalifornia 



INA COOLBRITH 



N Eastern visitor to our State once said to me that "While our 

 domestic flowers graced the entire year, instead of only a por- 

 tion, with a greater luxuriance of bloom, yet they lacked the 

 perfume of those of the East, and as for wild flowers, we had 

 none." Whereat I looked my amazement, For surely, few 

 lands, if any, can boast a more diversified and beautiful flora 

 than that of California, from the shy spring-born wood anemone of mossy 

 banks and forest spaces, to the midsummer azalea, beloved 'specially of the 

 Yosemite; from the humble yerba buena, the "good herb" of the Indians 

 and early Mission days, to the gaunt, weird yucca palm of the desert. 



I remember the wild mustard of the plains in the old days, leagues 

 upon leagues of it, thickly sown as a field of grain, in which one could lose 

 oneself as in a jungle — so tall that it topped the stage-coach as it passed; 

 and the great areas ablaze with the yellow disks of the sunflower, which 

 could give to the tired traveler shade and shelter in its ranks from the noon- 

 day heat, and furnished in the autumn a harvest of seed-food to the cattle 

 herds. And the California poppy — "El copa de Oro," indeed — the splendor 

 of which not even its later acquired name of eschscholtzia can dim! — 

 which, tradition says, so mantled with its orange sheen the shores and the 

 portals to the Bay of San Francisco at the time of the harbor's discovery 

 as to be the inspiration of the name it bears, the "Golden Gate." 



Not many are the wild flowers known to New England and the Mid 

 West not duplicated here, for the climates of California are many — while 

 a multitude which could not bear the rigor of their winter months are sown 

 broadcast throughout the State's extent. We may not see that dainty first- 

 ling of their year, the snowdrop, but lifting through the white drifts of the 

 Sierras is the marvelous snow plant, of which the poet* has sung: 



"How perfect has thy stature grown, 

 Thou waxen rosy-tinted cone! 

 A flame incarnate thou! 

 All fruits are compassed in thy zone, 

 All blossoms thee endow." 



The trees and shrubs of canon and hillside have their distinctive 

 bloom. The noble laurel, with its clean, polished leaf; the madrone and 

 manzanita, flowering in pale green, and white, and pink; even that bane 

 and ban of the country-side, the poison oak, is beautiful with small green- 

 ish flowers and gorgeous foliage, luring to disaster; the wonderful fern- 

 world, with the delicate saxifrage in its midst; daisies and primroses and 

 buttercups; cups called "gold" and "cream" and "sun," all filled to the 

 brim with perfume; purple lupine; blue harebell; heartease; "shooting stars," 

 or cyclamen; golden yarrow; calypso; wood-balm; pansies; violets, purple, 

 white and blue; the harebell, prettily styled the "lantern of the fairies"; 

 fuchsia, or "humming bird's trumpet"; Indian pink; Indian paintbrush; 

 columbine; Canterbury bell; nemophiela, or "baby-blue-eyes"; trillium, or 

 wake-robin; gilia in endless variety; pussy's ears; lilac; hyacinth; sand ver- 

 bena; the iris, purple, white and yellow; the lilies — what a group! — white, 

 black, brown, lemon, ruby, the leopard, the tiger, the fawn, the chamise 

 and the coast lily, the little Alpine and the beautiful Mariposa lily (or 

 poppy), hovering like a "butterfly," indeed, above the grasses; the wild 

 rose; the larkspur; morning-glory; the wonderful Matilija poppy, with stems 

 from two to fifteen feet high and blooms from six to nine inches across; the 

 bleeding heart; the ice plant; the cacti, queen of sandy places, many of 

 kind and gorgeous in bloom colors; and the world of minute blossoms of 

 which I shall name but one, the trientalis, a small, tender plant bearing its 

 tiny pink stars on a stem so thread-like as to be almost invisible. I learned 



