252 A COMPOSITE FAMILY 



ers of the people, flowers that may be gathered 

 freely, that are undiscouraged by much handling, 

 reviving cheerfully and living for weeks after a 

 protracted journey under the seat of a picnic wagon, 

 and dangerously easy to transplant, in short, to 

 be considered and used decoratively more as we 

 regard textile fabrics than as flowers. 



Taken individually, however, and from the 

 standpoint of calling each member of this Com- 

 posite household by name, the Goldenrods, outside 

 of half a dozen well-marked species, offer the Chi- 

 nese puzzle of the floral world. In fact, they are 

 a byword among plant students, who say that if a 

 botanist is ever condemned to the severest punish- 

 ment that the underworld can mete, the penalty 

 will be to write a monograph, accurately describing 

 and identifying all the known Goldenrods. 



As I have often found, in connection with 

 tramps afield, when I least expect the unexpected, 

 it happens. Nell lifted the Goldenrod haze that 

 had made me oblivious as to exactly which of 

 the wood roads we were following, by stopping 

 suddenly and giving a sort of interrogative whinny, 

 as much as to ask, "Do we tie here?" To my 

 surprise I found that we were abreast of an old 

 shed, under which she had often spent the middle 



