68 THE AMERICAN BOTANIST. 



recalling Mr. Boffin and Silas We.^g is invitingly near my 

 house. At times when the limitations of age are too much 

 in evidence and long trips are precluded, I gird up m^' 

 loins, strap on a vasculum, and put in an hour's hunt on 

 the delightful mass of disjecta. 



Here one sees in full action the unending struggle lor 

 existence. It is not necessarily the fittest that survive. 

 The strong w^eed achieves success by sheer vigor, but there 

 is many a politician and shrewd business-man among 

 these contestants ready to profit by any mistake of a 

 neighbor. Woe to the weakling ! He goes under and is 

 trampled down. 



See how some plants, unable from any innate force to 

 aspire, use the shoulders of others to raise them to the 

 light! Such are the twiners and climbers that wriggle in 

 and out of the general scramble. They have their "ends" 

 and "full" and "half-backs." One sees, too, the despicable 

 parasite, ma3^be, often of good family, who has sunk to 

 doing nothing for himself, and who prej-'s upon his neigh- 

 bors. 



There is the nettle that says "hands off!", the brier, 

 aggressive at every point, the wild cucumber, and the 

 balsam-apple. Some of them are protected by spines or 

 prickles, or some, like the milkweed, b^' easily exuding juice 

 that hardens in the air, thus miring ants or other intrud- 

 ers. How much one may learn here of plant protection ! 



In direct juxtaposition are plants of high and of low 

 affiliation; coreopses in intimate association with pig- 

 weeds; amaranths and holly-hocks cheek-by -j o wl ; the 

 morning-glory enwrapping the thorn-apple; the bind- 

 weed hugging a thistle ; the purslane hustling its cousin 

 portulaca. 



The ruined cellars of old houses are favorite resorts of 

 waifs. Man}- regetable tramps therein find a home. We 

 seethe thistle and fig together in one such place, though it 

 is doubtful if one can gather figs from these thistles. A 

 queer place for a fig-tree surely, but a little seed here found 

 a congenial home and the resultant plant has thus far re- 



