A WORD FOR WEEDS. 



237 



the weed of all, tobacco. Says Calverley 

 in "Fly Leaves :" 



'"Cats may have had their goose 



Cooked by tobacco juice, 

 Yet, why desire its use- 

 Thought fully taken ?" 



Whether or not we consider it harmful, 

 from the view of economics we must 

 realize its utility and. if we see a field 

 of it in bloom, all its trumpets blowing, 

 concede its beauty. With the exception 

 of Indian corn and cotton, there surely 

 can he no handsomer crop. 



Consulting another dictionary, quite 

 at random, we find "a weed is a trouble- 

 some plant." So is a potato, if we enter 

 upon a campaign against the ten lived 

 Colorado beetle. So is a raspberry, if 

 we get into a tangle of its prickly shoots ; 

 or the mountain laurel, if we attempt to 

 penetrate a copse of its elastic boughs. 

 Thistles are, to be sure, "troublesome," 

 but how gorgeous, on the other hand, 

 they may become ! Does the lamentable 

 fact that opium is abused make a weed 

 out of a poppy? If one ranks its ex- 

 quisite blossoms among weeds, why not 

 at once enter in the same list, lilies, irises 

 and arethusa? 



Despite the various and incongruous 

 views of what constitutes a weed, most 

 people have a good working idea of one 

 at its best — or worst. No one ever hesi- 

 tates to classify a pigweed, the "Jimson 

 weed" or "thorn-apple," the Amaran- 

 thus, most knotweeds, purslane, carpet- 

 weed, beggar-ticks, cocklebur and bur- 

 dock as weeds. Only one of them, the 

 thorn-apple, has any conspicuous beauty; 

 but this, though full of rare grace, is, 

 after all, coarse, ill smelling, — not of 

 the aristocracy of plants. Yet how very 

 near does it approach to even regal hon- 

 or ; its cousin. Datura mctcUoidcs of the 

 far West is one of the grandest and most 

 fragrant of flowers. 



The vast majority of weeds in this 

 country are of European origin. They 

 arrived years ago with our ancestors and 

 still are coming with later Jews, Gentiles 

 and dwellers in Mesopotamia. In some 

 cases, no doubt, were they brought with 

 deliberation, as flowers, the immigrants 

 feeling a prescience that all here would 



be new and therefore insistent for home 

 faces. Thus, the little daisy-like May- 

 weed may have come. Others, possibly, 

 like tansy and cypress spurge, were 

 deemed medicinal and were introduced 

 for domestic purposes — or the home 

 pharmacopoeia. Many arrived with 

 more valuable seeds or adherent to cloth- 

 ing, merchandise or ballast. 



Every botanist knows what fun it is 

 to collect on a ballast heap. Such a 

 place is equal with an enthusiast to a 

 visit to Kew or the New York or St. 

 Louis botanic gardens. lie is quite sure 

 to find some stranger, some waif, from 

 far off, foreign countries or distant parts 

 of our own. 



The question of how these plants sud- 

 denly appear and whence they come is 

 one of the most interesting of the by- 

 problems of botany. The least careful 

 observer, the child even, knowjs that 

 many plants are provided with special 

 apparatus for their distribution. Bur- 

 dock and cocklebur, worthless weeds both, 

 so far as we yet know, are bristling with 

 hooks or grapnels that lay hold of the 

 fleece or fur of animals, upon articles of 

 commerce or even upon the apparel of 

 man. 



Beggar-ticks make use of their re- 

 trorse barbs, acting in the manner of 

 fishhooks, easily penetrating any fabric, 

 but caught more firmly by any effort to 

 remove them. A vast number of weeds 

 resort to aerial navigation, a problem 

 they have perfectly solved. Look at the 

 parachutes of milkweed, the "clock" of 

 dandelion or the down of thistle and 

 hawkweed. Three or more species of 

 the latter, unknown in our country thirty 

 years ago, are now spreading over New 

 England and the Middle States. They 

 come from Europe, and no Custom 

 House turns them back. ( )ne, from the 

 intense color and beauty of its flowers, 

 formerly called Venus 's paint brush, is 

 now referred to the devil for the same 

 artistic uses. Another, of later arrival, 

 assumes the name of the old boy him- 

 self and is called "viny devil." 



Other plants, but these are mainly 

 trees and shrubs, are borne by variously 

 contrived wings, as maple, ash, ailanthus 

 and linden. "Tumble-weeds" are such as 

 at full fruition roll up, disengage from 



