Part 76

Audibertia grandiflora, Benth. Mint Family.

Coarse plants, with woolly stems; one to three feet high. Leaves.--Opposite; wrinkly; white-woolly beneath; crenate; the lower three to eight inches long; hastate-lanceolate; on margined petioles; upper sessile; pointed. Inflorescence.--Over a foot long, with many large, widely separated whorls of crimson flowers. Corollas.--Eighteen lines long. Stamens and style much exserted. Flower-bracts.--Ovate; sharp-pointed; often crimson-tinged. (Otherwise as A. stachyoides.) Hab.--The Coast Ranges, from San Mateo southward.

This, the largest-flowered of all our Audibertias, becomes especially conspicuous by April and May in southern woodlands, where its large, dark flower-clusters may be seen in little companies amid the shadows. The leaves and bracts are quite viscid, and have a rather rank, unpleasant odor; but the flowers are not without a certain comeliness. The long, crimson trumpets are arranged in whorls about the stems, projecting from many densely crowded bracts. Tier after tier of these interrupted whorls, sometimes as many as nine, mount the stems. The bracts and stems are usually of a rich bronze, which harmonizes finely with the color of the flowers. The joint in the filament is quite conspicuous in this species.

"Humming-birds that dart in the sun like green and golden arrows"

seem to be the sole beneficiaries of the abundant nectar in these deep tubes.

CALIFORNIAN SWEET-SCENTED SHRUB.

WESTERN SPICE-BUSH.

Calycanthus occidentalis, Hook. and Arn. Sweet Shrub Family.

Shrubs.--Six to twelve feet high. Leaves.--Ovate to oblong-lanceolate; three to six inches long; dark green; roughish. Flowers.--Wine-colored (sometimes white); solitary; two inches or so across. Sepals, petals, and stamens indefinite, passing into each other; all coalescent below into the cuplike calyx-tube, on whose inner surface are borne the numerous carpels. Petals.--Linear-spatulate, usually tawny-tipped. Carpels becoming akenes. Hab.--From the lower Sacramento River northward.

This is one of our most beautiful shrubs. Upon the banks of streams, or often upon a shaded hillside where some little rill trickles out from a hidden source, it spreads its branches and lifts its canopy of ample leaves. There is a pleasant fragrance about the whole shrub, and the leaves, when crushed, are agreeably bitter. From April to November the charming flowers, like small wine-colored chrysanthemums, are produced; and these are followed by the prettily veined, urn-shaped seed-vessels, which remain upon the bushes until after the next season's flowers appear, by which time they are almost black. It is from these cuplike seed-vessels that the genus takes its name, which is derived from two Greek words, meaning flower and cup.

INDIAN PINK.

Silene Californica, Durand. Pink Family.

Root.--Deep. Stems.--Several; procumbent or sub-erect; leafy. Leaves.--Ovate-elliptic or lanceolate; eighteen lines to four inches long. Flowers.--Brilliant scarlet; over an inch across. Calyx.--Five-toothed. Petals.--Five; long-clawed; the blades variously cleft, and with two erect toothlike appendages at the throat. Stamens.--Ten; exserted with the three filiform styles. Ovary.--One-celled. Hab.--Widely distributed.

The Indian pink is one of the most beautiful of our flowers, and it appeals to the aesthetic sense in a way few flowers do. Its brilliant scarlet blossoms brighten the soft browns of our roadsides in early summer, and gleam amid the green of thickets like bits of fire. Its corolla is elegantly slashed, and it is altogether a much finer flower than the southern form, S. laciniata. Its rather broad leaves are often quite viscid to the touch, in which respect it shares in the character from which the genus was named in allusion to Silenus, the companion of Bacchus, who is described as covered with foam.

S. laciniata, Cav., is a similar species found from Central California southward. It is usually a taller plant, with many stems and narrow leaves. It is also quite viscid, and many small insects, mostly ants, are almost always to be seen ensnared upon its stems. We are at a loss to account for this until we remember what Sir John Lubbock says in this connection. He suggests that ants are not very desirable visitors for promoting cross-fertilization among plants, as their progress is slow, and they cannot visit many plants far apart. On the other hand, winged insects, such as bees, butterflies, and moths, making long excursions through the air, are admirably adapted for bringing pollen from distant plants. Hence plants spread their attractions for such insects, while they often contrive all sorts of ingenious devices for keeping undesirable ones, like ants, away from their flowers.

The Spanish-Californians call this plant "Yerba del Indio," and make it into a tea which they esteem as a remedy for all sorts of aches and pains, and use as a healing application to ulcers.

Another species--S. Hookeri, Nutt.--is easily known by its large pink flowers, often two and a half inches across, and delicately slashed. This is found in our western counties, growing upon wooded hillsides, where its charming flowers show to excellent advantage.

COAST LILY.

Lilium maritimum, Kell. Lily Family.

Bulb.--Conical; twelve to eighteen lines thick, with closely appressed scales. Stem.--One to three feet high; slender. Leaves.--Seldom, if at all, whorled; linear or narrowly oblanceolate; obtuse; one to five inches long. Flowers.--One to five; deep blood-red; spotted with purple; long-pediceled; horizontal. Perianth-segments.--Six; lanceolate; eighteen lines long; the upper third somewhat recurved. Hab.--Near the Coast, from San Mateo to Mendocino County.

The little Coast lily is found most abundantly in the black peat bogs of Mendocino County, though it ranges southward to San Mateo County and northward to Humboldt County.

Mr. Purdy says of it: "It is seldom seen farther than two miles from the ocean. On the edges of the bogs the lily is often a dwarf, blossoming at three or four inches. In the bogs it roots itself in the tufts, and becomes a lovely plant five feet high with ten or fifteen fine blossoms."

The leaves are dark, glossy green and the blossoms are more cylindrical than funnel-form, the three inner segments spreading more than the outer, which remain almost erect. The little oval anthers, with cinnamon-colored pollen, almost fill the narrow tube and conceal the fact that the segments are yellow below and more decidedly spotted.

CHOLLA-CACTUS.

Opuntia prolifera, Engelm. Cactus Family.

Leafless, spiny, arborescent shrubs, three to ten feet high, with elongated, cylindrical joints, covered with oblong tubercles which bear from three to eight spines. Longest spines twelve to eighteen lines long. Stems.--Two to seven inches thick. Flowers.--Purplish-red; densely clustered at the ends of the branches. Sepals, petals, and stamens, many. Ovary.--One-celled. Style one. Stigmas several. Fruit.--Green; obovate; concave on the top; having no spines, only bristles; usually sterile; often producing other flowers. Hab.--From Ventura to San Diego and southward.

Upon dry hills, even as far north as Ventura, the cholla cactus is a familiar feature of the landscape. In many places it forms extensive and impassable thickets, which afford an asylum to many delicate and tender plants that retire to it as a last refuge from sheep and cattle.

The young joints, which are clustered at the ends of the branches, are from three to nine inches long. By means of their barbed spines, these adhere to any passing object, and as they break off very readily, they are thus often transported to a distance. As they root easily, this seems to afford a means of propagation, in the absence of seed--for the fruit is usually seedless.