The Camden chronicle. (Camden, Tenn.) 1890-current, 1903-06-26
ALAND OF LITTLE RAIN.
DEATH VALLEY THE LoNELlEsT
REGION IN THE WORLD.


Properly equipped, Il is possible to
90 safely across that CHASTITY sink
death yalley-the Armagosa desert
IN eastern California;, yet every year
It takes its toll Of death, and yet men
find there sun-dried mummies, Of
whom no trace or recollection is pre-
served. To underestimate ones thirst
TO pass a given landmark 10 the right
or left, 10 find a dry string where one
looked for running water-there is no
help for any of these things.
Along springs and sunkeh water
courses one is surprised to find such
water-loying plants as grow widely in
moist ground, but the true desert
breeds its own kind, each In its particu-
lar habitat The angle Of the slope,
the frontage OF a hill, the structure Of
the soil determines the plant South
looking hills are nearly bare, and the
tree-line higher here by a thousand
feet. Canyons running east and west
will have one wall naked and one
clothed Around dry lakes ad marshes
the heritage preserves a set and order
ly arrangement. Most species have
we'll defined areas Of growth. the best
index the voiceless land can give the
traveller of his whereabouts.
Nothing the desert produces ex-
presses it better than the unhappy
growth Of the tree yuccas. Tormented,
thin forests of it stalk drearily in the
high mesas, particularly in that tri-
angular slit that fans out eastward
from the meeting of the Sierras and
coastwise hills where the first swings
across the southern end of the San
Joaquin valley The yucca bustles with
bayonet-pointed leaves, dull green,
growing shaggy with age, tipped with
panicles of fetid greenish bloom. After
death, which is slow, the ghostly, hol-
low network of its woody skeleton,
with hardly power to rot, makes the
moonlight fearful. Before the yucca
has come to full flower the Indians
roast its buds for their own delectation.
Other yuccas, cacti, low herbs, a thous-
and sorts, one finds journeying east
from the coastwise hills There is
neither poverty Of soil nor species to
account for the sparseness of desert
growth, but simply that each plant re-
Quires more room. So much earth must
must be pre-empted to extract so
much moisture. The real struggle for
existence, the real brain of the plant,
is underground; above there is room
for rounded perfect growth. In
Death valley, reputed the very core Of
desolation, are nearly two hundred
identified species. Above the tree-line,
which is also the snow line, mapped
out abruptly by the sun, one finds
spreading growth of pinon, juniper
branched nearly to the ground, lilac,
sage, and white pine
There is no special preponderance Of
self-fertilized or wind fortified plants,
but everyweher the demand for and
evidence OF insect life. Now where
there are seeds and insects there will
be birds and small mammals, and
where these are, will come the Sinking
sharp-toothed kind that prey or them.
Go as far as you dare in the heart Of
a lonely land, you can not go so far
that life and death are not before you.
Painted lizards slip in and out of rock
crevices, and pant on the white, hot
sands. Birds, humming-birds even,
nest in the cactus scrub; woodpeckers
befriend the demoniac yuccas; out of
the stark, treeless waste rings the mu-
sic of the night-singingm ocking-bird If
1t be summer and the sun we'll down,
there will be a burrowing owl to call.
Strange furry, tricksy things dart
across the open places, or sit motion
less in the coming towers of the creo-
sote
The poet may have named all the
birds without a gun" but not the fairy
footed, ground-inhabiting furtive,
small folk of the rainless regions They
are too many and too swift; how many
you would not believe without seeing
the footprint tracings in the sand. They
are nearly all night workers, finding
the days too hot and white In mid-des-
ert, where there are no cattle, there
are no birds of carbon but if you go
far in that direction the chances are
that you will. find yourself Swallowed
by their tilted wings. Nothing so large
as a man can move unspied upon that
country, and they know we'll how the
land deals with strangers. There are
hints to be had here of the way in
which a land forces new habits on its
jewellers.
If one is inclined to wonder at first
how so MANY dwellers came to ha in