To avoid this men who work in the mines have found that a snake will not go near this oktea, and they have built closely knit fences around their tents, with little gates to go in and out, and beyond this the rattler will not penetrate. It was first the Indians of the desert who discovered this deadly shrub, and they got the secret from birds and animals, which, to protect their young, travel sometimes many miles back and forth, bringing the thorns with which to cover their little nests. Gophers and other small animals there cover their nests in this manner.—Los Angeles Times.
(1090)
FERTILITY
These lines are by Edward Rowland Sill:
Clear water on smooth rock
Could give no foothold for a single flower,
Or slenderest shaft of grain:
The stone must crumble under storm and rain,
The forests crash beneath the whirlwind’s power,
And broken boughs from any a tempest-shock,