All the ground was covered,
not with grass and green leaves, but with radiant corollas, about
ankle-deep next the foot-hills, knee-deep or more five or six miles out.
Here were bahia, madia, madaria, burrielia, chrysopsis, corethrogyne,
grindelia, etc., growing in close social congregations of various shades
of yellow, blending finely with the purples of clarkia, orthocarpus, and
oenothera, whose delicate petals were drinking the vital sunbeams
without giving back any sparkling glow.
[Illustration: A BEE-RANCH IN LOWER CALIFORNIA.]
Because so long a period of extreme drought succeeds the rainy season,
most of the vegetation is composed of annuals, which spring up
simultaneously, and bloom together at about the same height above the
ground, the general surface being but slightly ruffled by the taller
phacelias, pentstemons, and groups of _Salvia carduacea_, the king of
the mints.
Sauntering in any direction, hundreds of these happy sun-plants brushed
against my feet at every step, and closed over them as if I were wading
in liquid gold. The air was sweet with fragrance, the larks sang their
blessed songs, rising on the wing as I advanced, then sinking out of
sight in the polleny sod, while myriads of wild bees stirred the lower
air with their monotonous hum--monotonous, yet forever fresh and sweet
as every-day sunshine.
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