In late summer the pink Lessingia is apparent along dry roadsides or embankments, where its blossoms make charming masses of soft color. It is quite abundant in the Yosemite, especially in the lower end of the valley.

L. Germanorum, Cham., found plentifully from San Diego to San Francisco, has yellow flowers.

ELEPHANTS' HEADS.

Pedicularis Grœnlandica, Retz. Figwort Family.

Stems.—Tall and slender; smooth. Leaves.—Alternate; lanceolate in outline; pinnately parted into linear-lanceolate, serrate divisions; diminishing upward into the flower-bracts. Flowers.—Pink; in a dense spike several inches long. Calyx.—Five-toothed. Corolla.—With short tube and bilabiate limb. Upper lip with a long beak, like an elephant's trunk; lower three-lobed, deflexed. Stamens.—Four. Filaments and style filiform; sheathed in the beak. Ovary.—Two-celled. Hab.—The Sierras from King's River northward; and eastward to Hudson's Bay.

No more curious flower could be found than this little denizen of our alpine meadows. Its tall pink spikes attract one from a distance, and astonish one upon nearer acquaintance by the wonderful resemblance of their blossoms to many small elephants' heads. The forehead, the long ears hanging at the sides of the head, and the long, slender, curving trunk are all perfectly simulated.

These flowers have a pleasant perfume.

Another species—P. attollens, Gray—often found growing with the above, is similar to it in general structure, but its leaves are more dissected, its flower-spike is rather woolly, and its beak is only two or three lines long. These blossoms bear no resemblance to the elephant.

[LESSINGIA—Lessingia leptoclada.]