722 
THE GARDENING WORLD. 
July 13, 1889. 
A RECENT VISIT TO MEXICO. 
By Mu. C. T. Druery.* 
The following notes were made during a recent visit to 
Northern Mexico, via New York -.—Leaving England 
early in January, and arriving in New York only about 
a week later, nothing was to be expected there more 
than a possibly severer phase of -winter. One is, 
however, struck at once by an absolute absence of all 
greenness in the woods which here and there fringe the 
Hudson River. Here, in Great Britain, even in the 
depth of winter, the Hollies, Ivies, and other evergreen 
growths contribute a certain amount of verdure to the 
landscape. In the American woods, however, on my 
line of route this feature was entirely absent, and the 
winter landscape is one of apparent death, the gaunt 
bare trunks and branches being absolutely unrelieved 
by any signs of life. This, I was informed, was due 
to the far greater intensity of the winters there, and it 
seems feasible that, on the principle of the survival of 
the fittest, trees minus leaves would have a better 
chance— say, in a blizzard—than those having anything 
in the shape of foliage. I noticed that even the few 
Conifers made hardly any show, being brown and thin 
in foliage. 
The Winter in New York. 
In New York the winter had been abnormally mild, 
but going up the Hudson the river gradually assumed 
a more and more arctic appearance, until near Albany 
it was covered with floes and hummocks of ice, though 
very little snow was visible until we reached Buffalo, 
near Niagara, where some inches were lying. Though 
so near the Falls, I decided to postpone a visit until 
my return. Stopping an hour or so in Chicago, and 
walking up the nearest principal street to the depot, 
State Street, I was first struck by the enormous 
quantity of Bananas on sale in the streets. These 
were much larger than those usually sold here. I also 
noticed a red variety. So far I had noticed no Ferns, 
but some very fine specimens of Maidenhair were 
exhibited growing in one of the shop windows, where 
six handsomely dressed girls were standing combing 
their luxuriant locks, which extended in every case to 
their feet, advertising thus a celebrated hair restorer. 
Passers-by were invited to walk in and have a chat 
with these ladies as to “how it was done,” but my 
native modesty prevented me from inspecting more 
closely these specimens of the true Capillus-Yeneris. 
It struck me that this variety must be pretty hardy to 
stand the exposure they did. 
From Chicago onwards for some 1,000 miles or so 
little that is botanically noteworthy is observable from 
the train, possibly partly due to the season of the year, 
but mainly to the flat monotonous nature of the 
country, the prairies extending in all directions flat as 
ocean itself. The next main point was Kansas City— 
forty-three hours without a break—a great centre of the 
pork trade, Apropos of which a gentleman in the train 
told me the following anecdote An expert in the 
pork trade was being conducted over one of the factories 
here, where a pig can be driven alive into one end of a 
machine, and five minutes later emerge as sausages. 
The object in this business is of course to avoid all w'aste 
and utilise every by-product, and in this special factory 
it was fondly assumed that perfection had been obtained 
in this respect, and absolutely nothing lost. The 
gentleman, however, conducting the expert was 
surprised at a certain reserve in his verdict on this 
point. Pressing for an explanation of what more could 
possibly be done, he received for reply, “Well, I 
reckon you do the thing pretty considerable slick, but 
there are two by-products you don’t use worth a cent.” 
“Two by-products,” said his conductor, “you surprise 
me, I thought we had used everything.” “No, you 
ain’t ; first of all you waste the squeal entirely, and 
you’ve quite forgotten to use up the stink.” On the 
fourth day 
The Green Prairies 
began to be transformed into sandy desert plains, 
dotted with Yuccas of sundry species, with here and 
there a solitary Cactus, indicating a decided approach 
to the south, though icicles were hanging in profusion 
round the watertanks at every depot, and snow was 
lying in many places. Arrived at Nogales, a small 
town on the frontier of Arizona, Mexico, where I had 
to stay some days, I devoted my spare time to exploring 
the country round in search of Ferns, but at first sight 
despaired in toto of seeing any of the family in so 
apparently arid and scorched a country. The land¬ 
scape consists of a succession of low rolling hills 
exactly resembling heaps of reddish road metal, 
* Extracted from a paper read at the meeting of the Horticul¬ 
tural Club on June 11th. 
dotted here and there with Yuccas and Agaves 
sticking up like huge spherical bunches of radiating 
bayonets ; beyond these hills were visible ranges of 
mountains some 4,000 to 6,900 ft. high, equally bare 
and unpromising. On my first walk, however, I was 
agreeably undeceived, for the first canon or valley I 
turned into between two of the small hills yielded 
several very beautiful species of Ferns, among them 
some Cheilanthes and silvery Nothochlfenas, which I 
found growing freely in the crevices of the rocks, and 
though small evidently quite at home. One of the 
most striking things to me was the fact that I found 
associated here, and thriving in each other’s society, 
Ferns and Cacti, the representatives of inhabitants of 
at once the most humid and shady and the most arid 
and sunny habitats, and what was equally strange to 
me was that while all the species would be relegated 
here to a warm greenhouse and carefully protected 
from a single trace of frost, not only was snow lying 
in the chinks of the rock, but icicles 5 ft. long were 
depending from the tank in the depdt, and I was 
credibly informed, and could from my own sensations 
easily believe it, that 20° of frost had been registered 
there this winter. 
Fern Hunting about Nogales. 
In connection with this I should mention that Nogales 
stands 4,000 ft. above the sea level. Fern-hunting here 
is not without adventures. "While going through a tuft 
of Cheilanthes on one side of a huge rock my com¬ 
panion informed me that there was a better specimen 
on his side, but that I had better come down and not 
get over the rock as I might have done, as I should 
get a better view that way. I followed his advice, and 
found the specimen to be a fine large rattlesnake bask¬ 
ing on the rock and fast asleep. A revolver bullet 
through the neck closed his career somewhat unex¬ 
pectedly, as he simply slid down all coiled as he was 
and without giving us the music of his rattle at all. 
This find was quite a surprise, as they are usually 
dormant until March or April, and this was the end of 
January only. Rambling over the hills some very 
beautiful Cacti were visible here and there in the more 
exposed situations. Some consisted of seven or eight 
perfectly round balls about 6 ins. in diameter and 
heaped together ; others were oblong and solitary, with 
a pink ring near the apex ; others were very much 
flattened and deeply corrugated, but all alike bristled 
with thorns. The Opuntias or Prickly Pears were 
represented by two species—one with long formidable- 
looking thorns, the other apparently almost devoid, 
but only apparently, for, like many of their brethren, 
besides these large and obvious weapons of defence, 
every bud produces numberless very minute thorns or 
spicules which come off on the slightest touch, and are 
only felt when they have got well beneath the skin, 
perhaps half an hour after one fondly imagines the foe 
is left behind. 
Pursuing my Fern hunt I was gratified by finding 
that very pretty Fern, Pteris tenuifolia, of which two 
forms exist there—one with obtuse oval pinnules, the 
other with sharply pointed narrow ones, P. ornithopus. 
A fine crenate pinnate Nothochlfena, very much re¬ 
sembling in habit and growth our Ceterach officinarum, 
was also found. From this district I brought home 
fronds of Nothochlaena rufa, N. dealbata, N. Newberyi, 
N. sinuata, Gymnogramma hispida, Pteris ternifolia, 
P. ornithopus var. brachyptera, Pellcea marginata, P. 
pulchella, Cheilanthes elegans, and C. Eatoni (?). The 
trees of the locality are chiefly "Walnut and Black Oak. 
On the former I observed a considerable quantity of 
Mistleto not very dissimilar to ours, but with much 
shorter and wider leaves. 
Further South. 
The next place I visited was Hermosillo, some 170 
miles further south, and at a considerably lower 
elevation. The main part of my journey was made at 
night, but in the morning I found the train very 
slowly plodding along through a plain, bounded at 
some distance by a line of hills of decent height. The 
plain now was bristling with thorny vegetation of many 
species, but mainly Cacti, which formed huge clumps 
10 to 12 ft. high, intermingled with confused spiky 
masses of other species, which seemed to replace the 
Brambles of this country, while the larger ones of the 
Cereus species took the place of trees ; this growth 
continued until within about half a mile from Hei- 
mosillo, where the hills closed in, dotted all over with 
much larger specimens of the Cereus tribe, now some 
15 ft. to 20 ft. high, each plant resembling nothing so 
much as some thirty or forty immense corrugated 
Cucumbers, springing perpendicularly from one point. 
Suddenly, however, as we entered the suburbs of 
Hermosillo we seemed to plunge at one leap into the 
tropics ; groves of tall Palm trees were seen surrounded 
by a luxurious growth of Bamboos and Castor Oil 
Plants, mingled with Orange groves, and all basking 
in a temperature the first week in February of about 
90° in the shade, and by contrast with Nogales 
apparently about 150°.in the sun. The change was so 
sudden and so great that when I alighted at the depot 
I half felt as if I had been dreaming, and was still in 
the land of visions. The sudden change is probably 
due to the effect of radiation of heat from the hills 
around, added to the protection they afford from wind. 
The houses here, as in all the cities of Northern Mexico, 
consist of one story only, the rooms and offices being 
built round a central square or oblong courtyard, with 
more or less pretension to be a garden, generally less. 
Leaving Hermosillo and the railway, my next trip was 
Up the Sonora River, 
The bed of which, from here to its source, forms one of 
the few so-called roads of the district—roads which are 
utterly at the mercy of the weather, a sudden attack of 
rain being liable to imprison travellers between imprac¬ 
ticable fords, with only a possible option between 
taking to the hills or submitting to Mexican fare of 
tortillas and beans in one of the native villages until it 
pleases Jupiter Pluvius to open the road again. Here, 
as nearly everywhere, the hills were bristling with the 
huge Cucumber-like Cacti aforesaid, locally called 
Pitayos ; every chink in the rock had its tenant, and 
many thousands were in view at once. Several species 
of Acacia (Mesquite), and a white ghost-like tree, 
called Palo Blanco, or the White Stick, were inter¬ 
mingled with these Cacti, the Palo Blanco presenting a 
very curious, tortuous, drooping appearance, as if the 
upper half was dead. This I found was really the 
case, owing to a severe frost the previous year, which 
had cut them all half-way down. The pink Yerbena 
of our gardens was a common weed here, as also was 
wild Tobacco. A small yellow (Enothera or Evening 
Primrose took the place of our Primula morning and 
evening, and Eschscholtzia califomica replaced our 
Buttercups. Agaves, here called Mescal Plants, were 
plentiful, and every now and then donkeys laden -with 
their huge Pine Apple-like roots were seen proceeding 
to the Mescal ranches, where the only spirit of the 
country is distilled. This spirit is very strong and in¬ 
toxicating, but has the reputation of leaving no head¬ 
ache behind it ; its taste is indescribable, and requires 
an apprenticeship before it can be appreciated. Three 
species of (Enothera I found in the district, one of 
which, (E. taraxacifolia, is marvellously beautiful in its 
native habitats, the huge snow-white flowers, about 
4 ins. in diameter, forming solid clumps 1 ft. across, 
gleaming like snow-heaps in the moonlight, but dis¬ 
appearing like all the family soon after sunrise. All 
three species were of the same habit and foliage— i.e., 
cl la Dandelion. The specific name of the largest, 
taraxacifolia, may do for all three. Some of the 
Acacias here (Mesquite) bore huge pendent bunches of 
two sorts of Mistleto, both quite different from ours, 
the leaves being almost entirely aborted, and the plants 
consisting solely of long, pendulous, jointed stalks and 
minute blossoms. I was told by one of the Mexicans 
that if these were dried and smoked as cigarettes—two 
or three whiffs sufficing, as the active principle was 
very strong—a powerful remedy was afforded for 
coughs. While camping out by the river, I explored 
some rocks close by, and found a species of Lastrea, 
not unlike L. thelypteris, but of different habit of 
growth—possibly L. nova boracensis. 
The Yuccas and Cactuses. 
During the latter part of my stay in Mexico the season 
had sufficiently advanced for many of the Yucca and 
Cactus tribes to be in blossom, and I can hardly imagine 
a finer sight than I had on one of my trips over the 
hills, when I came across a huge Yucca with some five 
or six immense spikes of its pure white Lily-like blooui 3 
just in perfection. There must have been several 
hundred blossoms, forming a dense bunch of white, 
some 4 ft. high by 2 ft. through. When I came up it 
was in absolute perfection, and constituted a really 
regal bouquet. 
The common Prickly Pear Cactus (Opuntia), as large 
as a fair-sized Rhododendron, and smothered with large 
pale yellow blossoms, is also a sight to be seen. This 
plant is given a place in orchards for the sake of its 
fruits, and under cultivation assumes the dimensions of 
a good-sized tree, with a trunk a foot or more in 
diameter. It is curious in this case to see the trans¬ 
mutation of the first flat oval leaf or leaves into a thick 
wooden trunk. The skeletons of these old leaves are 
very beautiful in their lace-like design, and might, I 
