BUTTERCUP FAMILY. Ranunculaceae. 



closely back. The akenes have hooked beaks. This runs 

 into many scarcely distinguishable varieties. 



Few flowers are more beautiful and interesting in color 

 and construction than Larkspurs. We are all familiar 

 with their tall spires of oddly-shaped blossoms, growing in 

 gardens, and we find them even more charming in their 

 natural surroundings, glowing like sapphires on desert 

 sands, or adorning mountain woods with patches of vivid 

 color. There are many kinds; ours are perennials, with 

 palmately-divided leaves and usually blue or white flowers, 

 very irregular in form, with five sepals, resembling petals, 

 the upper one prolonged into a spur at the back, and 

 usually four petals, two of which are small and inside the 

 calyx-spur, the larger two partly covering the pistils and 

 the numerous stamens. The pistils, from one to five, be- 

 come many-seeded pods. Some Larkspurs are poisonous 

 to cattle. The Latin name is from a fancied resemblance 

 of the flower to the dolphin of decorative art. Spanish 

 Calif ornians call it Espuela del caballero, Cavalier's spur. 

 Though sometimes rather small, this is 

 Delphinium extremely pretty. In the Grand Canyon, 



scapdsum on the plateau, it is about a foot tall, with 



Blue rather leathery, brownish-green leaves, 



Summer mostly from the root, and from five to 



Ariz., New Mex. 



twelve flowers in a cluster. They measure 



nearly an inch across and are brilliant and iridescent in 

 coloring, as except for two small whitish petals, they are the 

 deepest, brightest blue, exquisitely tinted with violet, with 

 brown anthers. At Tucson, among the rocks above the 

 Desert Laboratory, it grows to over a foot in height, with a 

 cluster over six inches long and light dull-green leaves, 

 slightly stiff and thick, with long leaf-stalks, the lobes 

 tipped with a bristle, forming a handsome clump. This 

 grows on dry plains and rocky hillsides, up to seven thou- 

 sand feet. The picture is from a Grand Canyon plant. 

 . If the flowers were a little less pale in 



Delphinium color this would be a gorgeous plant, for 



Hdnseni it sometimes grows nearly four feet high. 



White, pinkish The branching stem springs from a 



CalTf^mia duster f thick ' ta P erin g roots, each 



branch terminating in a long, crowded 

 cluster of twenty or thirty flowers, opalescent in tint, 

 128 



