THE AMERICAN BOTANIST. 69 



sisted the winter. Here, too, the grape-vine loves to 

 nestle, warming up with ruddy glow its emerald beads; 

 Wild mustard shows a mass of yellow bloom, recalling 

 the beautiful wood-picture in "Ramona." The celandine 

 exhibits its yellow blossoms, the diurnal lychnis its pink 

 ones. To give a tropical look to the picture, the sumac 

 presents its long, pinnate, coppery -tinted leaves. 



On waste places, around railway termini and also on 

 lands used by shipping for discharge of ballast, one may 

 find immigrants still waiting for a pass-port, but thriving 

 all the while. Some of these may have come by rail from 

 distant states ; others are voyagers from trans-oceanic 

 regions. There are those that come to stay ; there are 

 those that abide only for a season. These last like not 

 our ways. Unfortunately, there are but few such. 



Most of our weeds are of foreign origin. They thrive 

 to the exclusion of the natives. They bring their language 

 and their customs with them. Such abandoned grounds 

 as we have been describing are a perennial delight to the 

 plant lover. They afford the seeker all the pleasures, and 

 few of the toils of exploration. At no expense he can see 

 a grand range of plants, and find on an ash-heap, quite 

 convenient to his home, what ordinarily might take along 

 journey to discover. 



Brown University, Providence, R. I. ' 



WITCH HAZEL NOTES. 



BY CHARLES FRANCIS SAUNDERS. 

 (o UPPLEMENTING Dr. Bailey's interesting article on 

 -^ the witch hazel in the September issue of The Amer- 

 ican Botanist, I might state that the hazel {Corylus aveh 

 lana) of Europe has furnished divining rods from time im- 

 memorial, and the use of the witch hazel's switches for the 

 purpose of locating hidden veins of water is no doubt to 

 be traced to our early settlers, mistaking the American 

 shrub for a sort of true hazel. A number of plants have 

 been used as stock for divining rods abroad — the tamarisk, 



