No. 133.] 347 



of it attains a height of ten feet. There is a grass there called 

 pin grass, a very curious growth ; it is one of the last in making 

 its appearance. There is also an acid clover, with which a 

 healthy and pleasant lemonade is made. This clover is common- 

 ly called sour clover. 



Mr. Dey. — There are acres and acres of the burr clover, and 

 also of a phlox, a beautiful flower which covers the ground as 

 thick as buckwheat. 



Mr. Shelton. — I weighed one sour clover root, with all its 

 branches, and it weighed three pounds. There grows abundant- 

 ly a sort of mint, a very fine aromatic. 



Rev. Mr. Fitch, from California. — The vegetation of Califor- 

 nia commences in November, with the rainy season, and begins 

 to dry up in June, and the drought continues until the ensuing No- 

 vember, and generally without dew. It has been said recently 

 that rains fell occasionally in the dry seasons, which hitherto had 

 not been known, so that lately some of the dry fodder had been 

 destroyed. 



Mr. Shelton. — I observed that they cut barley sometimes about 

 the last of May, and are in no hurry to carry it in — they let it 

 lay where it fell, in swathe, and kept in perfect condition. 



Eev. Mr. Fitch. — Wheat grows well there. General Vallejo 

 told me that he had known one hundred bushels raised on one 

 acre of ground. That forty to sixty bushels is common. 



Mr. Dey. — I observed that when the wheat was first sown, the 

 crop is ordinarily about fifty bushels an acre. The same field, 

 without any culture or sowing, yields, in the following season, 

 from thirty to forty bushels an acre ; and in the third season the 

 crop (witliout sowing or culture) amounts to from twenty to thir- 

 ty bushels an acre. After this they plow and sow again. It was 

 in the vicinity of Sutter's Fort that I saw all this. 



Mr. Shelton. — On the first sowing of barley they sometimes 

 have, at the first crop, one hundred bushels an acre, and forty or 

 fifty in the second season, without plowing or sowing. 



