CHAPTER II 



THE PALM OASES AND CANONS 



Poetry of the palm — Palm canons and oases — The desert's travel- 

 centres — Snow Creek Canon — Dual characteristics — Chino 

 Canon — The vegetation of drought — Palms, snow, and luxury 



— Tahquitz the Rumbler — Cave-life in Andreas Caiion — Indian 

 relics — A palm temple — La Reina del Canon — Cave-company 



— A winter storm — Narrow escape for Kaweah — Marooned — 

 Not drowned as reported — Tahquitz Canon, a desert Colosseum 



— Magnesia Spring Canon — Tropic luxury — A night vigil for 

 cougar — Bighorn — A cached olla — Deep Canon — The oco- 

 tillo — Animal and bird life — Palms and flowers — Rattle- 

 snake company — Thousand Palm Canon — A palm forest — 



— "The Twelve Apostles" — Seven Palms Oasis — Harried by 

 wind — Two-Bunch Palms — Unique landscapes — Wagnerian 

 moonlight — Palm Springs Village — Its medicinal spring — 

 Romantic Palm Canon — "Movie" vandals — Suggestion: a 

 National Park. 



THOUGH the palm is certainly not the most 

 beautiful, it is perhaps the most poetic of trees. 

 In symmetry of tapering shaft, fountain-like burst 

 of crown, and play of glossy frond, it is the ideal of 

 gracefulness in plant life. Incidentally, there is the 

 charm of its "atmosphere" of literary allusion, of 

 which it probably has more than any other tree can 

 claim. To dwellers in cold or temperate climates it 

 brings also alluring thoughts of tropic warmth, 

 skies normally sunny, and a life emancipated from 

 winter flannels. 



Spreading up from Northern Mexico, a number 

 of groups of the fan-palm, Washingtonia filifera, are 

 found in the caflons and oases of the Colorado 

 Desert. They are known to but few, and those are 



