Part 80

Later in the season, the large cordate leaves are quite conspicuous, and cause people to wonder what may have been the flower of so fine a vine.

TURK'S-HEAD CACTUS. TURBAN CACTUS.

Echinocactus viridescens, Nutt. Cactus Family.

Depressed, hemispherical, fleshy, leafless plants, with from thirteen to twenty-one prominent, vertical ribs, bearing groups of rigid spines; usually less than a foot in diameter. Spines.--Straight or recurved; stout; reddish; transversely ribbed or ringed. Flowers.--Sessile; borne about the depressed woolly center; yellowish-green; about eighteen lines long. Sepals.--Many; closely imbricated; merging into the numerous, oblong, scarious petals; sometimes nerved with red. Stamens.--Very many. Ovary.--One-celled. Stigmas twelve to fifteen; linear. Berry.--Pulpy; green; scaly. Hab.--From San Diego inland.

The Turk's-head cactus looks very much like the end of a watermelon protruding from the ground, if one could imagine a watermelon deeply furrowed and furnished with very formidable spines.

This plant is abundant near San Diego, growing all over the mesas; and it is marvelous that horses and cattle are not more often injured by stepping upon these disagreeable, horrent globes; but long experience has doubtless taught them the instinct of caution.

The plant is really beautiful when crowned with its circle of gauzy, yellow-green flowers, which are more like some exquisite artificial fabrication than real flowers. The fruit of this cactus is slightly acid and rather pleasant.

The plant is cultivated in Europe under the name of Echinocactus Californicus.

FAIRY BELLS. DROPS OF GOLD.

Prosartes Hookeri, Torr. Lily Family.

Rootstock.--Creeping; spreading. Stem.--A foot or two high; branching horizontally. Leaves.--Alternate; ovate; cordate; acute; several-nerved; two or three inches long. Flowers.--Greenish; one to six; six lines long; pendulous under the ends of the branches. Perianth.--Spreading-campanulate. Segments.--Six; lanceolate; arched at the base. Stamens.--Six; equaling or exceeding the perianth. Ovary.--Three-celled. Style slender; entire. Fruit.--An obovate, somewhat pubescent berry; golden, ripening to scarlet. Syn.--Disporum Hookeri, Britt. Hab.--The Coast Ranges from Marin County to Santa Cruz; in shady woods, but not by the water.

In our walks through the April woods, we often notice a fine plant with branching stems, whose handsomely veined leaves are set obliquely to the stem and all lie in nearly the same horizontal plane. In our subsequent meetings with the plant it seems to change but little, and we begin to grow impatient for the coming of the flower, which, however, seems to show no disposition to appear. Some day, when bending over a bit of moss or a fern-frond, or peering into the silk-lined hole of a ground-spider, we suddenly catch a glimmer of something under the broad leaves of our hitherto disappointing plant, and hastening to examine it, we find to our amazement one or more exquisitely formed little green bells hanging from the tip of each branch. Later these are often succeeded by small berries, at first golden, and afterward scarlet.

The generic name, Prosartes, comes from a Greek word signifying to hang from, and is in allusion to the pendulous flowers. By some authorities this plant is called Disporum Hookeri. The common name, "drops of gold," applies to the berry.

Another species P. Menziesii, Don.--is found growing along stream-banks in the Coast Ranges from Marin County northward. This differs from the above in its longer, more cylindrical, milk-white flowers, and its salmon-colored berries. It usually blossoms a little later than the other species, lasting till June.

COMMON MUGWORT.

Artemisia vulgaris, var. Californica, Bess. Composite Family.

Stems.--Rather simple; a foot or two high. Leaves.--Ample; slashed downward into long acute lobes; green above; cottony-woolly beneath; bitter; strong-scented; the upper often entire, linear or lanceolate. Flower-heads.--Minute; two lines high, one broad; composed of tubular disk-flowers only; greenish, in long, slender, crowded panicles. Hab.--Near the Coast, from San Francisco northward.

This is a common weed along our roadsides, and is easily known by its slashed leaves with silvery under surfaces. These leaves are very bitter. This is closely allied to the wormwood, and by many people is called "wormwood."

ARTEMISIA. SAGEBRUSH.

Artemisia Californica, Less. Composite Family.

Stems.--Shrubby; four or five feet high; with many slender branches. Leaves.--Alternate; pinnately parted into three- to seven-filiform divisions; or entire and filiform; an inch or so long; strong-scented. Flower-heads.--Very small; two lines or less across; numerous, in narrow panicles; greenish; composed of tubular disk-flowers only. Hab.--Marin County to San Bernardino.

The Artemisia, or, as it is more commonly called, "sagebrush," is an old friend that we always expect to meet in our walks on rocky hill-slopes. Its leaves have a clean, bitter fragrance, similar to that of the mugwort, but sweeter, and when crushed in the hand they emit a strong odor of turpentine.

Dr. Behr tells me that in the early days the miners laid sprays of it in their beds to drive away the fleas.

The Spanish-Californians regard it as a panacea for all ills, and use it in the form of a strong wash to bathe wounds and swellings, with excellent results.

Another species--A. tridentata, Nutt.--is the shrubby form, growing so abundantly all over the alkali plains of the Great Basin, where it holds undisputed possession with the prairie-dog and the coyote. It has narrow, wedge-shaped leaves, which are three-toothed at the apex; and the whole plant has a strong odor of turpentine.

This is highly esteemed by the Indians as a medicinal plant.

WILD PIE-PLANT. CANAIGRE.

Rumex hymenosepalus, Torr. Buckwheat Family.