
358 THE SAGE-BRUSH. 
ently questioned, and cannot tell when or where he noticed 
the phenomenon. All the specimens met with, and their 
name is legion, look as if they had been produced, not only 
mature, but aged; as if they were coeval with the moun- 
tains and plains upon which they are found. To the defi- 
ciency of chlorophyl in the plant is to be attributed its 
generally wretched appearance, which is increased by the 
tendency which the brittle twigs evince to break into snags 
and prickles. 
Where the plant grows to a height of from six to ten feet, 
as it occasionally does, it is indicative of good soil, and gen- 
erally of water or moisture present at certain seasons. If it 
is then uprooted, and vegetables planted in its place, they 
thrive most abundantly. All that is wanting to much of the 
apparently sterile soil is the necessary rain to refresh it. 
Perseverence in systematic irrigation has, in some places, 
recovered the desert and aitei it to “blossom like the 
rose.” The artemisia scorns the alkali flats, and in such 
localities is succeeded by the wretched grease-wood ( Obione 
canescens), and various chenopodiums and other salt loving 
plants. Some of these are most uninviting and indescriba- 
ble in appearance. To the traveller they are the synonyms 
of abomination. 
The sage brush grows in clumps, usually separated a few 
feet from each other. Often it surmounts a mound of sand 
five or six feet in height. These elevations, rising above the 
general surface of the plain, dot it in every direction, and 
one may ride among them for days together. It would ap- 
pear that the plants - mark the siu: level of the plateau, 
and that the earth around has eia eroded where it was 
not bound by their interlacing roots. Whether the wind 
or rain, for it does rain here at times, has been the most 
| potential agent in producing this effect, I am not prepared 
: sd affirm. In any other country one would unhesitatingly 
clare in favor of the latter. Here, however, the wind is 


equally y pow g the face of nature. 


