Part 58

During this remarkable process, which consumes from two to four weeks, the terminal bud has remained dormant. But it now commences to grow, and in a couple of weeks the flower-cluster is complete in all its beauty. It is sometimes six inches across.

It often happens that before the flower has blossomed, the stem is broken off at the ground. Strangely enough, this seems not to matter at all, for it grows on and perfects its flowers just as though nothing had occurred. People often bring the stem indoors and allow it to climb up over the curtains, where they can watch the interesting process of its growth.

CALIFORNIAN ROSE-BAY.

Rhododendron Californicum, Hook. Heath Family.

Evergreen shrubs three to fifteen feet high. Leaves.--Four to six inches long; leathery. Flowers.--Rose-pink; in large clusters. Calyx.--Small; with rounded lobes. Corolla.--Broadly campanulate; two inches or so across; slightly irregular; with wavy, margined lobes; the upper spotted within. Stamens.--About equaling the corolla. Style crimson. Stigma funnel-form. (Otherwise as R. occidentale.) Hab.--From British Columbia to Marin County.

In our northern counties the rugged mountain-sides are often densely covered with the lovely rose-bay, which in early summer presents an appearance it would be impossible to rival. When the foliage, which is very rich in both quality and hue, is thickly massed with the great glowing flower-clusters, the sight is worth a pilgrimage to see. It is a shrub so beautiful, we marvel it is not generally cultivated in gardens.

The bees are very fond of the blossoms, but popular tradition ascribes a poisonous quality to the honey made from them.

We have noticed no perfume in these flowers, but the leaves are often quite pleasantly fragrant.

COMMON WILD ROSE.

Rosa Californica, Cham. and Schlecht. Rose Family.

Erect shrubs three to eight feet high. Prickles few; stout; recurved; mostly in pairs beneath the entire stipules. Leaves.--Alternate; pinnate; with five to seven leaflets. Leaflets.--Ovate or oblong; serrate. Flowers.--Few to many in clusters; pale-pink. Calyx.--With urn-shaped tube and five-cleft border, whose lobes are foliaceously tipped. Petals.--Five; six to nine lines long. Stamens.--Very numerous. Ovaries.--Several; bony; in, but free from, the calyx-tube. Hips.--Many; four or five lines through. Hab.--From San Diego to Oregon.

The wild rose is one of the few flowers that blooms cheerfully through the long summer days, lavishing its beautiful clusters of deliciously fragrant flowers as freely along the dusty roadside as in the more secluded thicket. In autumn it often seems inspired to a special luxuriance of blossoming, and it lingers to greet the asters and mingle its pink flowers and brilliant scarlet hips with their delicate lilacs.

R. gymnocarpa, Nutt., "the redwood-rose," is exquisitely dainty. This is found in shady places under the trees. It blooms earlier than the common species, and is neither so abundant nor so fragrant. Its flowers are barely an inch across and of a bright pink. The prickles are straight, and the calyx-lobes are without leafy tips, while the leaflets are small and shapely.

BEAUTIFUL CLARKIA.

Clarkia concinna (F. and M.), Greene. Evening-Primrose Family.

Stems.--Several inches to two feet high. Leaves.--One or two inches long. Flowers.--Axillary; sessile; parts in fours. Calyx.--Red-pink; tube an inch or more long. Petals.--Rose-pink; six lines to over an inch long. Ovary.--Four-celled. Syn.--Eucharidium concinnum, Fisch. and Mey. Hab.--The Coast Ranges, from Santa Barbara to Mendocino County.

In June these charming blossoms may be found in the company of the maidenhair fern fringing the banks of shady roads, or standing in glowing masses under the buckeye-trees. In them nature has ventured upon one of those rather daring color combinations of which we would have hardly dreamed, and the result is delightful. The petals are bright rose-pink, while the sepals are of a red pink.

SPREADING DOGBANE.

Apocynum androsaemifolium, L. Dogbane Family.

Erect; one to three feet high; spreading. Leaves.--Opposite; short-petioled; ovate or roundish; an inch or two long. Flowers.--Clustered; pink. Calyx.--Five-cleft. Corolla.--Campanulate; three or four lines long; with five revolute lobes; having a small scale at base, opposite each lobe. Stamens.--Five; on the corolla. Filaments short. Anthers erect around the stigma. Style none. Ovaries.--Two; becoming a pair of long pods. Seeds silky-tufted. Hab.--Widely distributed in the United States.

The small pink flowers of the spreading dogbane may be found all through the summer, often upon our driest hillsides. The shapely little blossoms are of a flesh-tint without, richly veined with deeper pink within, and quite fragrant. The plants have a milky juice and a tough fiber in the stem, similar to that in the American-Indian hemp. The plant was formerly supposed to be poisonous to dogs, from which fact it received its generic name, which translated gives the common English name, "dogbane." It is used in medicine as a remedy for rheumatic gout. The very long pods seem absurdly out of proportion to the small flowers.

A. cannabinum, L., the American-Indian hemp, is also found within our borders, but it grows along stream-banks and in marshy places. It has oblong, pointed leaves, and small greenish-white flowers, only two lines long, whose close cylindrical corollas hardly surpass the calyx. The yellowish-brown bark of this plant is very tough and fibrous, and at the same time soft and silky. Our Indians have always found it of the utmost value in the making of ropes, lariats, nets, mats, baskets, etc., and before the coming of the white man they even made certain articles of clothing of it. A tincture made from the root is a recognized drug in the pharmacopoeia. Professor Thouin, of Paris, says that a permanent dye may be obtained from a decoction of it, which is brown or black, according to the mordant used.

FIRECRACKER FLOWER.

Brodiaea coccinea, Gray. Lily Family.

Leaves.--Grasslike, a foot or two long. Scape.--One to three feet high; six- to fifteen-flowered. Perianth.--An inch or two long; rich crimson; the limb of six green or yellowish oblong lobes. Stamens.--Three; on the perianth. Filaments adnate to its tube. Anther tips exserted. Staminodia.--Three; broad; short; white; on the throat of the perianth, alternating with the stamens. Ovary.--Three-celled. Style exserted. Stigma three-lobed. Syn.--Brevoortia coccinea, Wats. Hab.--The mountains from Mendocino County to Shasta County.

When our northern valleys have become parched by the first heat of summer, many beautiful flowers are still to be found in deep cañon retreats, where the streams, overarched by great shadowing oaks, gush downward through leafy copses of hazelwood and thimble-berry by beds of moss and fern. Upon the walls of such charming gorges the firecracker flower rears its slender stem and shakes out its bunch of brilliant crimson blossoms. These are a prophetic symbol of our national holiday rather than an aid to its celebration--for they have often passed away before the Fourth of July.

GODETIA. FAREWELL TO SPRING.

Godetia viminea, Spach. Evening-Primrose Family.