156 THE PLANT WORLD 



Figwort Family. — The mulleins, toad-flax, snake-head, gerardias, 

 yellow foxgloves, pentstemon and painted-cup are popular plants. 

 The orange-colored flowers of the latter are very showy, and the plant 

 is not common and easily uprooted. Its parasitic habit renders it almost 

 impossible to transplant or cultivate, so that it is in need of protection. 

 It used to be abundant at Pelham, but has disappeared from there. 



Madder Family. — Bluets are universally loved and gathered. They 

 will stand transplanting and improve in cultivation. They deserve to 

 be propagated and protected. They are rather local and not abundant. 



Honey sucMe Family. — Elders and viburnums are showy both in flower 

 and fruit ; they deserve protection when native and cultivation in masses. 

 The trumpet-honeysuckle still exists within the limits of Greater New- 

 York, and would continue to exist in our parks, if the showy flowers did 

 not particularly attract attention, and the aphids were not so fond of the 

 leaves. The twin-flower used to grow in New Durham Swamp, and was 

 also found once near Patterson, but has long since disappeared from the 

 region. It should be protected by private owners. 



Bell-floiver Family. — The harebell grows in crevices of rocks in 

 many inaccessible places, hence it is still to be seen on the Palisades 

 and on rocky cliffs along the Hudson. It is still not uncommon in the 

 Catskills and the Berkshires. Of the lobelias, three species are showy; 

 the cardinal-flower, the great blue lobelia, and the pale blue spiked 

 one ; all are perennial and deserving of preservation and cultivation. 



Chicory Family. — Chicory and dandelion take care of themselves, 

 not only making long fleshy tap-roots, but flowering abundantly and 

 scattering their seeds far and wide. 



Ragiveed Family. — Such is the power of reproduction of the ragweed 

 that it takes posession of all cultivated fields after the crops are gathered, 

 and spreads into waste places and roadsides. Considering what a nuis- 

 ance they are to persons afflicted with hay -fever, they deserve to be 

 suppressed. 



Thistle Family. — The Compositae reproduce readily by seed, as 

 shown by their abundance, filling fields and roadsides with a wealth of 

 bloom. There seems no danger of exterminating them, and we may all 

 revel in asters and golden-rods, daisies and cone-flowers, sunflowers 

 and thistles, boneset, coltsfoot, tansy and wormwood. About 760 genera 

 and not less than 10,000 species of wide geographical distribution. 



The plea for protection occurs so many times in this enumeration, 

 that we may be accused of wanting to enforce as stringently as they do 

 in England the laws of enclosure and trespassing. We disclaim at once 

 all desire and wish to lessen the delightful freedom of our life in the 

 country, or to encourage high fences and multiple signs against tres- 



