I206 



Home Nature-Study Course. 



round-house fortress. The hooks 

 are all turned toward the flowers. 

 And how they grapple fast to 

 everything they touch! Cattle, 

 sheep, dogs, the clothing of pas- 

 sers-by, even the flying birds are 

 made to carry them to new homes. 

 Sometimes a seed-seeking bird is 

 caught and held by a whole clus- 

 ter of the cruel, hooked seed- 

 heads, and then it struggles help- 

 lessly and dies, a pitiful victim of 

 this wonderful mechanism for the 

 distribution of a weed. And this 

 is another reason for not letting 

 a burdock grow. 



Mullein (V erbascum thapsus) . — 

 Gray states that the scientific 

 name of this plant is corrupted 

 from Barbascum, "the bearded." 

 What could be more fitting to a 

 plant so densely hairy? When 

 one comes across one of the pale 

 green, woolly rosettes in the chilly 

 days of late autumn one is tempt- 

 ed to pluck the big fuzzy leaves 

 and use them for a muff. But it 

 would be much better to look at 

 the glittering hairs through a lens 

 and note that they are all branch- 

 ing and beautifully interlaced, 

 which is the reason they sparkle 

 so in dew or frost. And when the 

 tall, straight flower-stalk thrusts 

 upward in the second summer, 

 it, too, is hairy and wrapped 

 about by the winged bases of 

 the clasping leaves. Even in the 

 flower, three of the five stamens are bearded, those at the top, while the two 

 lower ones have longer filaments and are smooth; one cannot help wondering 

 what the reason for such an arrangement may be. The five yellow petals are 

 unequal, opening flat, and lasting but a day; the general rule of succession is from 

 the bottom to the top of the long club-like spike, but the rule is not well obeyed 

 and scattering blossoms may open on any part of it. The seed-vessels are globular, 

 also woolly on the outside, and set as closely on the spike as kernels on an ear 

 of com; and they are filled with tiny seeds which, when looked at with the lens, 

 are seen to be beautifvilly netted. Birds like them, particularly the goldfinches, 

 and as they remain with us all winter, birds make frequent calls on these store- 

 houses which are too tall even to be hidden by the snow. The mullein is not an 

 aggressive or very disagreeable weed. 



Mullein 



