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among horses and cattle. The animals nosing about among the branches of this plant for some tuft of grass or other morsel, dislodge the glochids and get them in their eyes. Every well-appointed dooryard or garden has one or more species of the cultivated cactus which produces edible fruits of which the Mexican is very fond. These are of many varieties, differing in the characters of the branches and the fruits, the latter varying in color from the deepest red to lemon color and in form entirely distinct. They form a very important item in the short list of foods upon which the poorer classes live.

In this desert region one can not but be impressed with the number and variety of the woody plants, shrubs and small trees, which are to be seen on every hand. Many of these are common in our own southwest—mezquite, ocotillo, creosote bush, Ephedra, Condalia, Koeberlinia, species of Atriplex and Acacia are among the most conspicuous, some are the same species and others different, and the less obvious things are, Lippia, Buddleia, Mortonia and many others. In all these the families of the Leguminosæ, Labiatæ and Compositæ are especially prominent, as they are elsewhere in desert regions. The shrubby growth gives color to the landscape, and in many places its whole aspect and character is due to these plants more than to the yuccas, agaves or cacti. Very few trees in this desert are more than fifteen feet high and the majority of them are much less, so that in no sense does the country seem wooded, except upon the highest ranges where pines and oaks occur.

Among these desert shrubs are some of unusual beauty. There is