98 Field, Forest, and Wayside Flowers 



rophyll is to be found in stems and foliage. The 

 mistletoe is still of a dingy or yellowish-green, 

 because it has not yet sunk to the lowest depths 

 of shiftlessness. It steals its food from the tree 

 upon which it grows, but steals it in an undi- 

 gested or half-digested state, and does its own di- 

 gesting. The yellow-rattle and the pretty painted- 

 cup practice a like sort of thieving. Their roots 

 draw moisture from the roots of their next neigh- 

 bors, instead of taking it direct from the soil. 

 But the sap thus appropriated cannot be used 

 in the building of vegetable tissue till it has been 

 worked over in the leaves, and as yellow-rattle 

 and painted-cup make use of their foliage, they 

 have retained it. 



There is a lower depth of parasitism than this, 

 in which the plant steals digested food from its 

 victim. When this stage of degradation is reached 

 the foliage of the parasite dwindles, and its green 

 color disappears. We have seven or eight native 

 plants which suck their food, already prepared, 

 from the roots of herbs and trees. They are rep- 

 resentatives of three widely-differing botanical 

 families, but similarity of practice has brought 

 about among them a certain similarity of aspect, 

 so that we may almost say that there is a rogue 



