JULY TO OCTOBER. 183 



American, while those that are do not, as a rule, fre- 

 quent the roadsides or the waste places around our 

 cities. The steeple bush and the cardinal flower, for 

 instance, prefer the open country ; but tansy, chicory, 

 wild carrot, thorn-apjDle, and toadflax are veritable 

 tramps who keep company with each other on the 

 outskirts of every town and city. But the mullein 

 prefei-s the pasture land, where, on the edge of some 

 hillock, it often poses for the artist in a picturesque 

 costume of pale yellow and green, with its feet hid- 

 den among the gray stones, and its head relieved by 

 the somber background of a gray thundercloud. 

 Nothino^ is softer or more delicate in color than the 

 pale-green, velvety leaves when they first appear 

 above ground. The flowers bloom all summer. 



Chicory. Chicory is one of our prettiest blue 



Cichorium intyhus. flowers ; it is blue enough to call it 

 blue, although I must call attention to the fact that 

 blue in a pure state does not exist on the petal of 

 any flower, wild or cultivated. I might with justice 

 except the familiar forget-me-not, whose quality of 

 color is very nearly a pure one. But chicory some- 

 times shows a very good blue, so we will not quarrel 

 with it. The little flower straps ai-e singularly 

 like those of the dandelion, and this fact betrays its 

 close relationship with the latter flower. Not only 

 these straps, but the center of the flower (the stamens 



