YEREA SANTA (Eriodictyon glutinbsum, Eenth.). Flowers 

 lilac, purple or white, y inch across or so, funnel-form, in coils of 

 a terminal panicle. Leaves lanceolate, dark, shiny-green 

 above, downy and netted-veined beneath, thick and resinous. 

 A shrub 3 to 7 feet high, blooming May to July, on dry foot- 

 hills and lower mountain slopes throughout California. 



Yerba Santa is Spanish for "holy herb," and attests the 

 value attached to it by the Spanish settlers in California. 

 Its leaves are a famous remedy for colds, grippe, consumption 

 and diseases of the blood, and are either made into a syrup 

 with sugar or steeped in spirits. Among the Indians its use is 

 immemorial. They not only made a tea of the dried leaves 

 for fevers and "general misery," but to some extent they 

 smoked them and chewed them like tobacco. The taste of 

 the leaves is bitter and resinous at first, but later becomes rather 

 pleasant. 



This species insensibly passes into another, E. tomentosum, 

 Benth., the leaves of which are densely clothed with a short 

 white wool. They possess a tonic property similar to Yerba 

 Santa. 



172 



