cactus.

by brett amy

Nature insists that something will fight heat and drouth even here, and so she designs strange growths that live a starved life, and bring forth after their kind with much labor.  Hardiest of the hardy are these plants and just as fierce in their way as the wild-cat.  You cannot touch them for the claw.  They have no idea of dying without a struggle.  You will find every one of them admirably fitted to endure.

– John C. Van Dyke, The Desert, 1901