aio THE NEW AGRICULTURE. 



called, is by no means devoid of vegetation. With the pro- 

 found changes which it is now known are possible to be 

 brought about in plant life, this is a fact of far-reaching sig- 

 nificance. In these inhospitable regions where there is but 

 a very scanty rainfall, and in the even more inhospitable re- 

 gions w r here no rain ever falls, the sagebrush, the greasewood, 

 the polo verde, the polo christi, the yellow-flowered opuntia, 

 the prickly pear, and the many other varieties of cacti all are 

 found, if not in abundance, at least as frequently as we 

 could expect. Many of these plants are worthless as food 

 both for man and beast, but they prove one thing, namely, 

 that the desert is capable of an abundant production, such 

 as it is. At present the most of them are not only uninviting, 

 they are positively repellent. They are fibrous, they contain 

 poisonous principles, they are covered with briars and spiculi. 

 These characteristics are evinced in the popular names : "the 

 prickly pear," "the creosote bush," "the green thorn," "the 

 Christ thorn," "the catclaws." If, now, one of these plants, 

 the cactus, for example, were something different from what 

 it is ; if only it had no thorns ; if its thick leaves and bulbous 

 fruits had an edible pulp instead of a fibrous formation, bring- 

 ing death to any creature feeding upon them ; if, ah ! if and 

 if what a change might be wrought in those millions and 

 millions of desert acres which we are hopeless of ever bring- 

 ing under irrigation because the water is impossible of being 

 procured for the purpose. When the oil is eliminated from 

 the growth of the greasewood; when the sagebrush is turned 

 into a shade tree ; when poison, fiber and thorn are bred out 

 of the nature of desert plants and the serviceable and the 

 edible and the nutritious are bred into them, then economic 

 changes of the first magnitude will be impending. 



