EVENING SNOW (Gilia dichdtoma, Benth.). Flowers salver- 

 form, fragrant, white, an inch across or more, with a brownish 

 margin on the outside, sessile in the forks of the branches or 

 terminating long stalks. The scanty leaves are thread-like, 

 simple or divided into 3 to 5 segments. A slender, branch- 

 ing annual a few inches to If feet tall, blooming in spring in the 

 foothills of Central California, and eastward in the deserts to 

 Arizona. 



My first acquaintance with this Gilia was rather dramatic. 

 One morning on the Mojave Desert of California we pitched 

 our camp in a spot that seemed innocent of any floral presence. 

 In the late afternoon happening to look from my tent door, I 

 was startled to see the ground all about white with myriads of 

 expanded blossoms of this plant, well named Evening Snow. 

 They remained open throughout the night exhaling a notice- 

 able fragrance, and in the morning they folded themselves 

 up very neatly like so many umbrellas, to repeat their per- 

 formance the next night. The stems were so slight and scanty 

 of leaf that when the corollas were shut, the whole plant 

 seemed to sink invisible into the background of yellow desert. 



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