Western Reserve chronicle. [volume] (Warren, Ohio) 1855-1921, 1860-09-12
EXUBERANCE OF CALIFORNIA
FLOWERS.

/ AUBERANCEU UF CAL1EUhN1A
FLOWERS.
The floral splendors of California in
Spring" are described By the Rev. starr
King, in the following extract from let
ter in rhetoric almost as gorgeous as the
vesture of the fields and hill sides through
which he passed during his first excursion
from San Francisco:-The first thing that
arrested attention after leaving the sandy
streets of San Francisco was the flowers
Early in May, in New England, people
hunt for flowers. A bunch of violets, OF a
sprig or two of brilliant color intermixed
with green, is sufficient trophy of tramp
that chills you, ,damps your feet, and posi-
bly, leaves the seeds of consumption. Here
they have flowers in May, not shy, but
rampant, as if nothing else had right to
be-howers by the acre, flowers by the
square mile, flowers as the visible carpet
of an immense mountain wall. You can
gather them in clumps, dozen varieties at
one pull. You can fll bushel basket in
FIVE minutes. You can reap them into
mounds. And the colors are charming as
the numbers are profuse. Yellow, purple,
violet, pink and pied, are spread around
you, now in seperate level masses, now two
or three combined in a swelling knoll, now
intermixed in gorgeous confusion.
Imagine yourself looking across hun
dred acres of wild meadow, stretching to
the base of hills nearly two thousand feet
high-the whole expapse swarming with
little straw colered, wild sunfowers, orange
poppies, squadrOns of purple beauties, bat
talions of pink-and then the mountain,
unbrOken by tree or rock, glowing with
the investiture of all these hues, softened
and kneaded by distance. This is what
saw on the road to San Mateo. The orange
and purple seemed to predominant in the
mountain robe But on the lower slopes,
and reaching midway its height, was
strange sprinkling of blue, gathered here
and there into intenser stripes, and run
ming now and then into sharp points, as if
over the general basis of purple, orange and
yellow, there had fallen violet snow, which
lay tenderly around the base, but in few
places on the side had been blown into
drifts and points.
The wild poppy of California, in May,
is the most fascinating of all the flowers.
It does not have striped or spotty leaf,
but it is stained with color which is a
compromise between a tea-rose and an or
ange, and is as delicately hushed and grad
uated in hue as a perfect rose. never
tire in studying their cOlors, in masses or
singly. While driving to San Mateo, we
camped upon little clumps Ofthem, spring
ing out of the rock on the edge of the road
that Overhangs the bay, and their vivid or
ange, upheld on graceful stems, and con-
trasted with the gray of the stones and the
blue of the bay, gave me joy which comes
up as fresh while 1 write as when saw it
at first. Another piece of cheer intrudes
itself between my eyes and the paper, and
insists that note shall be made of it. 1
mean California blackbird, perched on a
mustard stock ten feet high. The wild
mustard grows luxuriantly on the lands at
the foot of the bay. 1t is a great trouble
to the farmers, for if the cows eat little
of it-and they seem to like it for season.
ing-it gives pungent flavor to the milk,
and makes the butter bite But field of
it in brilliant yellow is to the eye decided
ly pleasant condiment to the general feast
of color. And when a blackbird, with a
large spot of scarlet on each wing, futters
over tall spear of it, and then alights
with a CHEEKY twitter, one has a picture be-
fore him which gives two fold delight, by
making him repeat the cOuplet of Holmes.
The crack Drained boboIink courts his crazy mate.
Poised q bulrush. tipsy with his weight.
If 1 quote wrongly, may the genial and
always accurate Professor forgive me. 1
repeat from memory, and must wait till
The "Mameluke" arrives from Boston with
my books, before 1 can verify a dozen pass
ages of his, which the California scenery
sets to music again in my brain.