18 BOTANY. 
are strikingly suggestive of a more northern birthplace. Besides this, there 
are Veratrum album, Zygadenus glaucus and Z. elegans, and Picea Engelmanni, 
which tend further to raise the same point of inquiry. The presence along 
the southern border of Arizona of that somewhat rare and localized fern, 
Ophioglossum vulgatum, in our present state of knowledge, can only remind 
us that there are still some points concerning the geographical distribution 
of plants that are unsettled ; the most probable conclusion, however, being 
that (if we banish separate centres of creation for the same species) it has 
at one time extended over almost our entire North American area. Its 
present situation in Arizona (on a low hot plain) divorces it from any 
necessary association with glacial agencies. 
From Southern Colorado to the Zuni Mountains in New Mexico, we 
may in the main make the journey, and avoid any considerable mountain- 
range. North, the “Spanish Mountains” of the older maps will be to the 
east; and further south, to the west, the various spurs will culminate in the 
Valles Mountains and the Nacimiento Range, whose highest peaks seldom, 
if ever, reach an elevation greater than 12,000 feet, while most of them are 
much lower. Along the valley of the Rio Grande, the general altitude 
ranges from about 7,700 feet to 5,026 feet at Albuquerque. This valley, 
whilst much cut up by transverse cafions and smaller streams, is in the 
main an area of aridity. Along the streams, the ever-present cottonwood 
will appear; the sandy or gravelly wastes be covered with the various 
Artemisias, Nyctaginaceous and Chenopodiaceous plants; and the mesas 
(or high tablelands) intervening between the streams will be covered with 
a sparse growth of bunch-grass and grama. Representatives of the Cactacee 
will be found constantly. 
‘Santa Fé, just south of the mountains of the same name, is situated at 
an altitude of 7,047 feet. The plain around is, except where watered by 
the small stream from the mountain behind, barren in the extreme; not, 
however, because the soil lacks the elements of fertility, for this it does not, 
but because it needs an abundant supply of water. 
So long ago as 1846, Mr. Fendler made large collections at this place, 
and as the results are so well known it is hardly requisite to do more than 
allude to the general outlines of the flora. The mountain-slopes back of 
