CANADA THISTLE LAW. 159 



are shaped by these pests. Summer fallowing so dwarfs them, 

 that the following wheat crop is not much disturbed. Two 

 good hoeings save the corn crop. A Scotchman said that in 

 his country they go among the growing grain, and with a spade- 

 chisel cut them below the surface. I met no one so hopeful as 

 to suggest that they would ever be exterminated. 



Will Illinois in like manner be inundated? If we tread 

 in their footsteps, we may read our doom in theirs. When I 

 came to Illinois thirty years ago, I remarked, that on the first 

 appearance of Canada thistles here, I would move farther West ; 

 but when I heard of them at Naperville, Rockford, and Joliet, 

 it excited my attention, but not to the moving point. Eight 

 years ago a neighbor, formerly from thistle-grown New Hamp- 

 shire, came excitedly to my door and announced that his " son 

 had discovered a patch of Canada thistles about one mile to 

 the west up the valley of Rocky Run." I visited the farm 

 and found an irregular patch covering about twenty-five square 

 rods. The tenant who rented the farm had noticed them, but 

 had not suspected their true character. Here was the dreaded 

 enemy at my door, but it was inconvenient to run, and I 

 thought it quite as valiant to face him and fight. My alarm 

 was communicated to the neighborhood, it spread to the 

 county, and through the prompt action of the Board of Super- 

 visors, a careful inspection was made and patches were found 

 in half the towns. 



The next General Assembly passed a Canada thistle law, 

 which now rests upon the statute books, and " rest " is the 

 exact word to express the situation. In Bureau county these 

 thistles were exterminated through the machinery of this law, 

 and in some others, but the people have gone to sleep on the 

 subject, and will not probably be aroused till fresh apprehen- 

 sions shall cause a more startling outcry. Still, it is something 

 to have the law, with its effective machinery ready to be in- 

 voked. The ridicule of this "law against weeds" did not 

 exclude it from going into the Revised Statutes. It rests upon 

 the same solid principle of public interest, and public safety, 

 as do the laws in regard to fires and contagious diseases in 



