38 Field, Forest, and Wayside Flowers 



not unpalatable spinach. It is not an uncommon 

 sight in spring to see some native of green Erin 

 equipped with a bag or basket and a big knife, 

 gathering tender dandelion tops, destined to fur- 

 nish forth the frugal dinner. Our Hibernian friends 

 thus circumvent Nature, and upset all her plans, 

 for the dandelions were filled with bitter juice 

 expressly in order that they should not be eaten. 

 The precaution works well as far as gnawing rab- 

 bits and moles or hungry caterpillars are con- 

 cerned, for we never find dandelion roots bitten 

 by rodents or tunnelled by grubs, and dandelion 

 leaves are never eaten into holes such as disfigure 

 the succulent foliage of the rose. Moreover, the 

 plant enjoys this immunity just at a time when 

 vegetable food is scarce, and the few plants which 

 have ventured up are overwhelmed with attention 

 from everything that is abroad, vegetarian and 

 hungry. Man is the only animal who cooks his 

 food, and owing to this accomplishment his bill 

 of fare is far more extensive than that of his 

 neighbors in feathers and fur, who take things as 

 they find them. 



If we pick one of the golden dandelion flowers, 

 we find that the stem is a hollow column, and 

 this structure, as every engineer knows, combines 



