Part 49

Usually viscid throughout. Stems.--Three to six feet high. Leaves.--Crowded at the base of the stem; six to ten inches long; small above. Flower-heads.--Of both ray- and disk-flowers. Rays.--Twelve to fifteen; one inch long; three-lobed at the apex; yellow, sometimes with a dark-red base. Involucre.--With one series of scales, each clasping a ray. Hab.--Throughout California, and in Oregon and Nevada.

This is one of the most beautiful of all our tarweeds. Its golden, Coreopsis-like flowers open after sunset, and close at the first warmth of the morning rays.

All the Madias are used medicinally by old Spanish settlers.

Madia sativa, Molina, is one of our most troublesome species, because its viscid secretion is so very abundant. The plants are tall, but the flowers are inconspicuous, owing to the smallness or absence of the rays. It is native of Chile as well as of California.

An oil of excellent quality was made from its seeds in that country before the olive was so abundant.

LEOPARD-LILY. TIGER-LILY.

Lilium pardalinum, Kell. Lily Family.

Bulbs consisting of forking rhizomes, covered with small, erect imbricated scales; often forming matted masses. Stems.--Three to ten feet high. Leaves.--Usually whorled, with some scattered above and below; lanceolate; three to seven inches long. Flowers.--Few to many; long-pediceled. Perianth segments.--Six; two or three inches long; six to nine lines wide; strongly revolute; with orange base and reddish or scarlet tips; spotted or dotted with purple on the lower half. Stamens.--Six. Anthers versatile. Ovary.--Three-celled. Style club-shaped. Stigma capitate. Capsule.--Eighteen lines or more long.

Hab.--The Coast Ranges and Sierras, from Santa Barbara County to British Columbia, and eastward.

No more magnificent sight could be imagined than a cañon-side covered with a mass of these red and gold blossoms nodding on their tall stems. The plants often grow in clumps and colonies of several hundred, and are always found in the rich soil of stream-banks or of wet, springy places. Most of us have been familiar with these spotted beauties from our childhood, with their delicately swinging anthers full of cinnamon-colored pollen.

A friend writing us from near Mt. Shasta, one July, said: "I wish you could have seen the grove of tiger-lilies we saw near the place where we rested and lunched. They sprang from a velvet bed of mosses and ferns, under the shadow of a great rock, that towered at least a hundred feet above them. Out of the rock sprang two streams of living water, ice-cold, which crossed the trail and dashed over a rock below. Upon one plant we counted twenty-five buds and blossoms, while a friend counted thirty-two upon another."

Under extraordinarily favorable conditions, this lily has been known to reach a height of ten feet.

YELLOW POND-LILY.

Nuphar polysepalum, Engelm. Water-Lily Family.

Leaves.--Six to twelve inches long; three fourths as wide; obtuse; deeply cleft at base; floating or erect. Flowers.--Floating; three to five inches across. Sepals.--Eight to twelve; petaloid; bright yellow, sometimes greenish without. Petals.--Twelve to eighteen; small; about equaling the stamens, and resembling them. Stamens.--Numerous; red; recurved in age; pollen yellow. Ovary.--Large; eight- to twenty-celled. Stigma button-shaped; many-rayed; four lines to an inch across. Hab.--From Colorado to Central California, and northward to Alaska.

Most of us are familiar with the yellow water-lily, and have seen its pretty shield-shaped leaves floating upon the surface of some glassy pond, starred with its large, golden flowers. The latter are sometimes five inches across and quite showy. Sometimes entire marshes are covered with the plants. The large seeds are very nutritious, and form an important article of diet among the northern Indians.

HUMBOLDT'S LILY. TIGER-LILY.

Lilium Humboldtii, Roezl and Leichtlin. Lily Family.

Bulbs.--Large; often weighing over a pound; with scales two or three inches long. Stems.--Stout; purplish; three or four feet high; eight- or ten-flowered, or more. Leaves.--Wavy-margined; roughish; Flowers.--Large; six to eight inches in diameter; golden yellow; spotted with pale purple, turning to red or brown. Segments.--Having papillose prominences near the base. (Otherwise like L. pardalinum.) Hab.--The foothills of the Sierras; southward to San Diego.

This wonderful lily, at first glance, resembles the common leopard- or tiger-lily--L. pardalinum--and it is found sometimes in the same regions as the latter, but never in the same kind of localities. It affects the loose soil of dry, upland woods, but never grows in wet or boggy places. Its flowers are larger than those of L. pardalinum, and have more of a golden hue and less of red in them.

By July this lily is in full bloom and a magnificent sight. A plant was once known which had fifty buds and blossoms, thirty of which were open at once!

COMMON SUNFLOWER.

Helianthus annuus, L. Composite Family.

Hispid, coarse plants. Stems.--Several feet high. Leaves.--Mostly alternate; petioled; deltoid-ovate to ovate-lanceolate; acuminate; three to seven inches long; three-ribbed at base. Flower-heads.--Large; three or four inches across, including the rays; solitary; composed of yellow ray-flowers and purple-brown, tubular disk-flowers. Involucre.--Of several series of imbricated, ovate, acuminate scales. Disk.--An inch or so across. Hab.--Throughout California.

The stately form of the sunflower is a common sight in the south, where whole fields are often covered with the plants. Their season of blossoming is supposed to be in the autumn, but we have seen them blooming just as gayly in March. This wild sunflower of the plains is believed to be the original parent of the large sunflower of our gardens.

Its seeds are used by the Indians as food and in the preparation of hair-oil.

Popular tradition makes this blossom a worshiper of the sun, and it is believed to follow him with admiring glances.

"The lofty follower of the sun, Sad when he sets, shuts up her hollow leaves, Drooping all night, and when he warm returns, Points her enamored bosom to his ray."