WILD, OR XATIVE FLOWERS. 85 



none ; the broken limbs were set by those in the settlement possessed 

 of the most nerve, while the elder women bound up the wounds, or 

 gathered the healing herbs which they had learned to distinguish by 

 experience, or from oral tradition, as being curative in certain disorders. 

 Something of this healing art was derived from their ancestors, who had 

 the knowledge from the Indian medicine-men ; and some remedies 

 were no doubt discovered by chance ; a happy thought seized upon, and 

 put into practice in some desperate case, where the chances of life hung 

 upon something being done to relieve the sufferer, effected a cure, and 

 established the fame of the remedy. 



To these simple people, no doubt, we owe many of the significant 

 local names by which our native plants are still distinguished, and 

 which will always be adopted when speaking of them in familiar parlance. 

 Occasionally we pause and ponder on the source whence such a 

 name as Boneset for Eupatoriim perfoUatum (L.) has been derived. We 

 can only surmise that the powerful virtues of the plant are serviceable 

 in cases of dislocations and fractures, by reducing fever and causing a 

 more healthy action of th.- blood, which accelerates the return to strength 

 in the injured limb. 



The sanative qualities of these plants are no new discovery, nor 

 are the medicinal properties confined to one species alone, some are 

 used in curing the bites of snakes, as E. ageratoides (L.) An infusion of 

 the leaves of another species is an excellent diet drink, almost all are 

 sudorifics and tonics. 



The genus Eupatorium is dedicated to Eupator Mithridates, who 

 is said to have used a species of the genus in medicine. Several species 

 of these homely plants are used in Fevers and Intermittents by the 

 Herb-doctors and Indians. 



The tallest and most showy of the Eupatoriums is 



Trumpet-weed — Thorough-wort. — E. purpureum, (L.) 



The flowers, in dense corymbs are of a deep flesh- colour, approaching 

 to red ; leaves, shining, coarsely veined, narrowing to a point, the upper 

 ones much narrower, mostly growing in whorls round the stout stem. 

 The plant has a bitter, somewhat resinous scent when the leaves are 

 bruised. This tall Thorough-wort is abundant on the banks of creeks 

 and in marshy places, where it often reaches the height of five or six 

 feet. 



The red-flowered Eupatorium, the old Thorough-wort of the 

 English herbalists, seems to resemble our Canadian plant very closely ; 



