growth. There is scarcely a day in the year 
when this slender creeping plant, with its infan- 
tile blossoms, may not be found in some sheltered 
corner of the open field, or in our own dooryard. 
To hold a place in the plant world for the family 
it needs to be always at work, winter as well as 
summer, producing seed of its kind. To be pro- 
ductive the flowers must be fertilized by their 
pollen, which bees and flies distribute during the 
summer, but which the flowers must do for them- 
selves during the winter. Night is the chick- 
weed’s time of rest. When the leaves in pairs 
are folded tenderly about the parent stem, the 
petals of the flower close, the head drops, and a 
chickweed sleeps. 
Another interesting flower of early winter is 
the witchhazel. In its bush habit it is abundant 
about Pine Hills and breaks into bloom from 
October to midwinter. A very beautiful speci- 
men of its tree form stands south of Seven Pines 
on the brow of the hill just where it tips down to 
Willow Run. It is twenty or more feet in 
height. In November, with not a leaf on the 
bare branches, it was covered with a profusion 
of blossoms — a little yellow flower setting fast 
to every twig. On the last of December, with 
the mercury at twenty degrees, it was yet in 
bloom and with many fresh flowers. The seed 
of the witchhazel matures very leisurely. Not 
till the following autumn, when fresh flowers 
appear, does it throw its seed. Side by side 
along the bare branches sit the hard seed capsule 
12 
