::»? TWO BIRD-LOVERS IN MEXICO B- 



in action and crest, but a delicate light gray in colour. 

 The female bird had just a suggestion of rose upon 

 throat and breast, but her mate, perching with half- 

 opened wings, glowed with the pure warm colour from 

 forehead, breast, under wings, and flanks. After a 

 minirte both birds disappeared and evaded all further 

 search. 



No matter how dried up a place appears, some flower 

 or plant finds nourishment enough to grow, and the 

 ditches and corn-fields of a Guadalajara midwinter 

 were no exception. Tall, thistle-like Mexican poppies 

 sent forth their pale, lemon-coloured flowers, brighten- 

 ing the dusty plain, and among the weeds growing 

 from the sides of the trenches were multitudes of tall 

 stalks bearing long, pendulous, scarlet blossoms, a spe- 

 cies of wild lobelia. Our favourites among the few 

 blossoms of this season were little wild ground ver- 

 benas which purpled the parched furrows in many 

 places. Their leaves were brittle, their roots seemed 

 as dry as a husk, yet they managed somehow to grow 

 and blossom in numbers. 



The most interesting objects for the botanists were 

 the many curious seed-pods of the weeds and other 

 plants hereabouts, from the great fruit clusters of the 

 castor-oil plants to the tiniest of seed-plumes. 



As we rambled through the trenches we sometimes 

 brushed asfainst a mass of laro-e ofolden o-lobes, struno- 

 close together along the leafless twigs of the plant — 



<4 48 ^ 



