Woe to him who tries to penetrate the chaparral when it is composed of this formidable and uncompromising shrub! The result is quite likely to be a humiliating progress upon hands and knees before he can extricate himself, probably with torn garments and scratched visage.

HEDGE-NETTLE.

Stachys bullata, Benth. Mint Family.

Rough, pubescent herbs. Stem.—Ten to eighteen inches high; four- angled. Leaves.—Opposite; ovate or ovate-oblong; cordate; coarsely crenate; wrinkly veined; petioled; an inch or two long. Flowers.—Pinkish; in a narrow, interrupted spike. Calyx.—Five-cleft. Corolla.—Eight lines long; bilabiate. Upper lip erect; lower deflexed, of three unequal lobes, spotted with purple. Stamens.—Four. Filaments hairy. Anthers divergently two-celled. Ovary.—Of four seedlike nutlets. Style filiform. Stigma two-cleft. Hab.—Throughout the State.

The hedge-nettles are common weeds, of which we have several species. S. bullata, so called on account of its leaves, which look as though blistered, is the most widespread. It is quite variable in aspect, and we are constantly meeting it in new guises and being deceived into believing it something finer than it really is, through some subtle change in its usually homely little pink flowers.

[CHAPARRAL PEA—Pickeringia montana.]

TWINING HYACINTH.

Brodiæa volubilis, Baker. Lily Family.

Coated corm about one inch in diameter. Leaves.—All radical; broadly linear; a foot or more long. Scape.—Twining; two to even twelve feet long; naked. Umbel.—Many-flowered. Perianth.—Five to eight lines long; rose-color without, whitish within. Stamens.—Three; alternating with three notched staminodia. Filaments winged; very short. Ovary.—Three-celled. Style short. Stigma capitate. Syn.—Stropholirion Californicum, Torr. Hab.—Sierra foothills, from Mariposa County northward.