VEGETATION OF SOUTHWESTERN TEXAS, 531 
trees, reduced in size; but shrubby species, peculiar to that region, represent the larger trees of the 
same or analogous genera of the more northern parts of the country. 
The stately walnut trees of your forests are there reduced to the low Juglans nana, a [226] 
shrub that bears nuts of the size of a musket-ball. In place of the mulberry of your river 
bottoms, we find there the small Morus parvifolia, with leaves of one-fourth the size. The fine 
hackberry (Celtis occidentalis), one of the largest trees on the fertile lands of our western woods, is 
there represented by a spring shrub of a nearly allied genus, which, not being able to find described 
in any work within my reach, I have assumed to name Acanthoceltis, 
In place of the buckeye, from which the citizens of your State sometimes receive a cognomen, 
we find there the pretty dwarfish Asculus discolor, which, however, also occurs in many Southern 
States, and the nearly allied Ungnadia, peculiar to those regions and remarkable for its small, sweet, 
but intoxicating and emetic nuts. 
The plum trees, not large in the north, become considerably smaller here; so Prunus rivularis 
and especially the very curious Prunus minutiflora, the leaves and flowers of which are hardly 
larger than cranberry leaves. Even the small red-bud tree is there represented by a low shrub, the 
Beavis occidentalis. 
All the shrubs just mentioned are representatives of northern trees; but one at least, the 
Guajacum angustifolium, holds the place of a tree, the well-known lignum vite, 
A few ligneous plants, arborescent along the coast, become shrubby in the region of the calcare- 
ous plateaus. So the majestic live-oak, the elegant evergreen Sophora speciosa, the valuable Condalia 
obovata, which the settlers use for dyeing blue. 
Again other plants, the relatives of which in the north are herbaceous, become there shrubby. 
Among these I will only mention several Euphorbiacee, and principally Crotonew, some Leguminose, 
and more than all the Afimosew. This elegant tribe of plants, considered by some to be the highest 
type of vegetable development, has towards the north, hardly higher up than the latitude of the 
Missouri River, only a few struggling low herbaceous representatives; farther south the species 
become more numerous, but all are herbaceous until coming on the Gulf shore to the Vachella, and 
westward on the Canadian River to the shrubby Algarobia glandulosa and Mimosa borealis. Only 
after having crossed the Brazos, and still more the Colorado Rivers, we meet with numerous shrubby 
Mimosece, some of them very elegant or very fragrant, and one, the well-known Mezquite (commonly 
called Muskit) of Southern Texas and Northern Mexico, the same Algarobia which has just been 
mentioned, becomes a large tree, reversing therein the general character of the ligneous plants of 
that region, important because in some parts of the country it becomes the only firewood. 
A large number of these shrubs have long-pointed or shorter-hooked spines; so the [227] 
Acanthoceltis, almost all the Mimosee, and the Condalia, already mentioned ; and with them a 
large number of Rhamacee, some Rosacee, Xanthoxylon, Castela. The pretty Berberis trifoliolata has 
spiny evergreen leaves. Numerous Yuccas with acutely pointed leaves (called “Spanish Bayonet”), 
and the bromeliaceous Dasylirions, with sharply serrated leaves, together with the divers represen- 
tatives of the Cactus tribe, complete this peculiar offensive, or rather defensive, character of that 
vegetation which I am inclined to call the “Chapparal-flora,” from the Mexican name, indicating 
dense shrubbery, —a name which has become familiar to us since the war. 
The Cactacee have been alluded to above. They deserve some further notice, as characteristic 
of that region. A few straggling representatives of this family are found farther north and east. 
The well-known “ Prickly Pear” (Opuntia vulgaris) is the only species discovered in the old States; 
one or two other species of the same genus are found west of the Mississippi, and on the upper 
waters of the Missouri; and there, also, a few Mamillarie make their appearance. But only after 
crossing the Brazos River, and entering what I have called Southwestern Texas, you get into 
the proper region of the Cactacee, which from there extends southwardly almost through the 
