A FLORAL WONDER.

Te Aroha News, Volume V, Issue 236, 7 January 1888, Page 4

A FLORAL WONDER.

"TnE most remarkable flower I have ever come across," said B. C. Truman, "is that lonely little thing -which grows 14,000 feet above the sea on Mount Witney — the highest mountain not only in California, but in the United State", and 1500 feet above the timber line, and at a point among the clouds where all other .vegetation has utterly deased to exist. It is tho monarch of the world among flow'era, however, and is radiant with beauty, and freights the atmosphere with aromatic sweets. There is no soil, not even a thimbleful, and no moisture except snow and hail and ice where it grows and looks pretty and'prouti. In fact, the little flower, during its short existence, goes to sleep in, icy, capsules every night, and faces the sunlight in the morning dripping with tears of opal r and pejrl. It is shaped like a bell flower, and is gaudy in colours of ted, purple, and blue. It is called Polemonium > conjer'tum, or Jacob's 'Ladder. Its fragrance partakes of the) white jasmine, with an assimilation of mußk.". It blooms alone: for it not only has no floral associates, not even a spear of grass or ; shrub, .» but i there is l no creature, noti even bird or insect;\to keepit company a single minute in theyear." . ' ■■.

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