188 The Romance of Wild Flowers 
less cut up or toothed. The arrangement of the 
florets is the same as in the Daisy: the yellow rays 
are pistillate, and the disk-florets contain both pistil 
and stamens. The Water Ragwort (S. aquaticus) 1s 
very similar, but larger and of laxer growth. 
In striking contrast to these is the Common 
Groundsel (S. vulgaris), an annual weed beloved of 
cage-birds, but detested by the gardener. This plant 
flowers all the year, like Chickweed. Originally a 
native of the colder parts of Europe and North Africa, 
it has gone with colonising Europeans to all the 
cooler places of the earth. From sixty to eighty 
florets are packed together in each drooping head, 
but all are tubular, and consequently the cylindrical 
heads are not very conspicuous. Occasionally they 
may be visited by insects, but appear to be principally 
self-fertilised. In this respect also Groundsel agrees 
with Chickweed, though it is probably not an 
instance of degeneration. The leaves are of a simpler 
character than those of the Ragwort. The fruits are 
provided with an abundant white pappus, which has 
obtained the name Senecio for the genus—from senea, 
an old man, the pappus (a word, by the way, which has 
the same meaning as senex) being supposed to repre- 
sent the white poll of the patriarch. When the seed 
is ripe, the pappus-hairs separate as widely as 
possible, forming a fluffy sphere, which may be wafted 
great distances by the slightest breeze. 
An allied species, the Mountain Groundsel (S. 
sylvaticus), shows some advance upon the last- 
mentioned, from which it has perhaps arisen, for its 
leaves though similar are more deeply cut, its heads 
are more numerous, held more horizontally, and often 
