From Blue to Purple j 



expand and close in apparent ecstasy as he tastes the tiny drop of I 



nectar in each dainty enamelled cup. Coming to feast with his I 



tongue dusted from anthers nearest the nectary, he pollenizes I 



the large stigmas of a short-styled blossom without touching its ■ 



tall anthers. But it is evident that he could not be depended on ■ 



to fertilize the long-styled form, with its smaller stigma, because of i 



this ability to insert his slender tongue from the side where it •! 



avoids contact. Flies and beetles enter the blossoms, but small ;j 



bees are best adapted as all-round benefactors. This simple-look- ^ 



ing blossom, that measures barely half an inch across, is clever j 



enough to multiply its lovely species a thousand fold, while many i 



a larger, and therefore one might suppose a wiser, flower dwindles \ 



toward extinction. j 



John Burroughs found a single bluet in blossom one January, ] 



near Washington, when the clump of earth on which it grew ^ 



was frozen solid. A pot of roots gathered in autumn and placed j 



in a sunny window has sent up a little colony of star-like flowers | 



throughout a winter. (Illustration, p. 28.) ; 



Wild, Common, or Card Teazel ; Gypsy Combs \ 



{Dipsaciis sylvestris) Teazel family b-^Z v i 



Flowers — Purple or lilac, small, packed in dense, cylindric heads, 3 j 



to 4 in. long ; growing singly on ends of footstalks, the flowers 1 



set among stiffly pointed, slender scales. Calyx cup-shaped, I 



4-toothed. Corolla 4-lobed; stamens 4; leaves of involucre, \ 



slender, bristled, curved upward as high as flower-head or ; 



beyond. Stems: 3 to 6 ft. high, stout, branched, leafy, with I 



numerous short prickles. Leaves: Opposite, lance-shaped, j 



seated on stem, with bristles along the stout midrib, \ 



Preferred Habitat — Roadsides and waste places. j 



Flowering Season — July- — September. j 



Distribution — Maine to Virginia, westward to Ontario and the 



Mississippi. Europe and Asia. ^ 



Manufacturers find that no invention can equal the natural 1 



teazel head for raising a nap on woollen cloth, because it breaks \ 



at any serious obstruction, whereas a metal substitute, in such a i 



case, tears the material. Accordingly, the plant is largely culti- \ 



vated in the west of England, and quantities that have been im- 1 



ported from France and Germany may be seen in wagons on the j 



way to the factories in any of the woollen-trade towns. After j 



the flower-heads wither, the stems are cut about eight inches long, 1 



stripped of prickles, to provide a handle, and after drying, the natu- j 



ral tool is ready for use. < 



Bristling with armor, the teazel is not often attacked by brows- 



63 



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