COMPOUND FLOWERS 1 49 



flowers ill June and July. The long erect scales of the involucre are a 

 striking feature in this plant. It is also known as C. pj/cnocephahis. 



4. Milk Thistle (C. maridnvs). — Leaves sessile, clasping, waved, 

 thorny, those of the root pinnatifid ; scales of the involucre somewhat 

 leafy, bending backwards, and with thorny edges ; root biennial. This 

 very handsome, stately plant, the Virgin Mary's Thistle, is often cultivated in 

 gardens for its beauty, but it is not commonly wild either in England or Scot- 

 land ; nor is it believed to be indigenous. It grows about Edinburgh, and 

 on the rock of Dumbarton ; and tradition tells that it was planted in the 

 latter place by Mary Queen of Scots. The stout and stiff stem is from three 

 to five feet high ; and the rich deep-green leaves, veined with clear white, at 

 once distinguish the plant from all others of the Thistle tribe. The flower, 

 which appears in June and July, is large and of a rich purple colour. It is 

 the handsomest of our native Thistles. The young leaves make an excellent 

 salad, and are in some countries considered a great luxury ; the tender stalks, 

 laid in water to remove their bitterness, and peeled, are a good vegetable ; 

 the scales of the involucre are as good as artichokes ; and in early spring the 

 roots may also be boiled for the table. In Apulia, the whole plant is cultivated 

 as fodder for cattle. By some it is made to constitute the genus Silijhum. 



20. Plume Thistle {CniniR). 



1. Spear Plume Thistle (C. lanceoldtus). — Heads of flowers large, 

 mostly solitary, stalked, egg-shaped ; scales of the involucre thorny, spreading, 

 woolly ; stem winged by the thorny leaves, the lobes of which are 2-cleft , 

 root biennial. This is a very common Thistle on waste places and hedges, 



where grow 



" Insatiate Thistles, tyrants of the plains, 

 And lurid hemlock tinged with poisonous stains." 



Well may the plant be abundant, for the seeds float on the summer air in 

 such profusion that the fields and lanes, for miles together, are whitened by 

 these downy plumes, which are wafted onwards by the slightest breath of 

 wind, gathering here and there in white masses, as some hedge or wide-spread 

 trunk of a tree impedes their progress. Were it not that the goldfinches and 

 chaflinches rob many of these plumes of the seed when they detach them from 

 the Thistle top, and were it not that the autumnal rain destroys many, the 

 whole land w^ould be full of Plume Thistles. Even as it is, the wind carries 

 off" many a feathery seed to a kindly soil, and the farmer finds his fields 

 encumbered with the produce of the neighbouring hedge-bank. It is trouble- 

 some on the land by its great size, yet it is not one of the worst of weeds, 

 because, being a biennial plant, it may be extirpated if cut down early, before 

 flowering. Nor is it a useless plant on the landscape. Dr. Withering 

 remarks : "Few plants are more disregarded than this, yet its use is consider- 

 able. If a heap of clay be thrown up, nothing would grow upon it for 

 several years, did not the seeds of this plant, wafted by the wind, fix and 

 vegetate thereon. Under shelter of this, other vegetation appears, and the 

 whole soon becomes fertile." The flowers, like those of the artichoke, and 

 of several other Thistles, have the power of curdling milk. Neither sheep 

 nor swine will touch this plant, and the horse and cow arc not fond of it. It 



