86 WILD, OR NATIVE FLOWERS. 



its habits, colours and qualities seem the same. When viewing the native 

 species it seems to carry my thoughts back to childish haunts on the banks 

 of the clear-flowing Waveney and the flowery Suffolk meadows 



•' Where in childhood I strayed, 



And phicked the wild flowers thai hung over its way. " 



A more graceful member of the Eupatorium family is the 



"White Snake-root — Eupaio7-ium ageratoides, (L.) 



which is a pretty, elegant, shrubby plant found in rich woods. The white 

 flowers are borne in compound corymbs. 



The leaves are from two to three inches long, toothed; narrowly 

 pointed, on long stalks and of a bright green, smooth and thin. Our 

 plant is about three feet high, wide and loosely spreading. The pretty 

 white corymbs of flowers make this an attraction, seen among the forest 

 herbage ; for at the season when it is in bloom most of the flowers have 

 disappeared from the woods. Not unfrequently we find in damp woods, 

 but more especially on open marshy ground, the well-known herb 



Bone-set — Eiipatoriuin pcrfolia/iiiii, (L.) 



This species is easily distinguished from any other by its veiny, 

 hoary, greyish-green leaves, united at the base around the stem, or perfo- 

 liate, the stem of the plant passing through the centre of each pair. 

 The large, closely-set corymbs of flowers are of a greenish- 

 white and want the pretty tasseUed appearance of tlie White Snake-root, 

 £. ageratoides. The scent of tliis more homely plant is strongly 

 resinous and bitter ; but it is held in great esteem for certain qualities of 

 a tonic and anti-febrile nature, and forms one of the old remedies for 

 ague and fever. 



In evidence of the value of the herb Bone-.set, Pursh gives a practi- 

 cal illustration from his personal experience of the efiicacy of its medicinal 

 virtues. He says : — 



"The whole plant is exceedingly hitter, and has been used forages 

 past by the natives in Intermittent l-evers ; it is known by its common 

 names, Thorough-wort and Bone-set. During my stay in the neighbour- 

 hood of Ontario, when both Influenza and I,ake-fever were raging, I saw 

 the benefit arising from the use of it, both as regarded myself and others. 

 It is used as a decoction, or as I considered more effectual, as nn infusion 

 or extract in rum or gin." ( Vide Pursh's Flora Anuriac Srpti-iifrionalis). 



