226 A ugust Soapwort. 



XLI. 



Soapwort Use of Soapwort Horsemint Common Mint Wild 

 Carrot Vervein Polygonum Change Dock-leaves, their Color 

 Hornbeam Juniper ; Bracken Heather Cherry Moun- 

 tain-Ash. 



LET us take a last look at the wild flowers before 

 the season for them is quite over. We never 

 could have omitted all mention of that handsome plant, 

 the common soapwort, or Saponaria, which in August 

 is prodigal of its large flowers, pink or nearly white, in 

 dense corymbs at the summit of the stem. Every house- 

 wife in country places where the plant grows, and where 

 people are simple enough and sensible enough to accept 

 a benefit directly from Nature without going to a shop 

 for it, every housewife so situated well knows that to 

 put this plant into her washing-tub is as good as a lump 

 of soap. It grows abundantly by the streams here, so 

 those two great aids to cleanliness, soap and water, are 

 given by Nature together. The saponaria is not only 

 useful but beautiful: a stately, handsome plant, that 

 holds quite an important place, especially on the little 

 islets in the streams; but the pale tender color of its 

 flowers is not so conspicuous as the brilliant yellow of 

 the senecio, for example, which abounds at the same 

 season. However, it is not merely for brilliancy that a 

 plant may have pictorial value: sometimes the very 



