66 CALIFORNIA DESERT TRAILS 



that filled the long canon from side to side ; the en- 

 closing walls, for hundreds of feet up, all painted to 

 one hue of yellow by uncountable myriads of encelia 

 blossoms. To name all the plants that entered into 

 the spring show would be impossible, but the three 

 plants that were most overpowering in volume were 

 the encelia, the beloperone, and the phacelia, yel- 

 low, red, and blue respectively. The cafion was a 

 jungle of these plants, the bushes of beloperone espe- 

 cially wonderful, many of them six feet high and 

 eight or ten feet long, wholly covered with the crim- 

 son blossoms. Humming-birds were whirring about, 

 nonplussed like myself at the sight (the plant is 

 known as flor de chuparosa, humming-bird flower, 

 in Mexico, I am told), and honey-loving insects of 

 every degree joined in keeping the air in a conglom- 

 erate hum. 



The other plant I named, the phacelia, or so- 

 called wild heliotrope, grew in loose tangles all about 

 the sturdier encelias and beloperones, climbing as 

 high as their support allowed and encircling their 

 yellow or crimson in wreaths of delicate blue. 



I must not overlook, either, that glory of desert 

 cafions in late spring, the flame-colored wild holly- 

 hock, SphcBvalcea ambigua. I call it flame-colored, 

 but it is not that, and everybody whom I have asked 

 to name the color has either named it differently or 

 politely declined to try. Along the base of rocky 

 walls you find bushes of the plant, with pale gray- 

 green leaves and superb sprays of blossom which 

 you may call pale vermilion, or apricot, or brick red, 

 or flame, without being correct in any of the terms. 



