AMONG THE WILD-FLOWERS 31 



What is this tall plant by the roadside 

 thickly hung with pendent clusters of long pur- 

 plish buds or tassels? The stalk is four feet 

 high, the lower leaves are large and lobed, and 

 the whole effect of the plant is striking. The 

 clusters of purple pendents have a very deco- 

 rative effect. This is a species of nabalus, of 

 the great composite family, and is sometimes 

 called lion's-foot. The flower is cream-colored, 

 but quite inconspicuous. The noticeable thing 

 about it is the drooping or pendulous clusters 

 of what appear to be buds, but which are the 

 involucres, bundles of purple scales, like little 

 staves, out of which the flower emerges. 



In another place I caught sight of something 

 intensely blue in a wet, weedy place, and on 

 getting some of it found it to be the closed 

 gentian, a flower to which I have already re- 

 ferred as never opening but always remaining 

 a bud. Four or five of these blue buds, each 

 like the end of your little finger and as long as 

 the first joint, crown the top of the stalk, set 

 in a rosette of green leaves. It is one of our 

 rarer flowers, and a very interesting one, well 

 worth getting out of the wagon to gather. As 

 I drove through a swampy part of Ulster 

 County, my attention was attracted by a climb- 

 ing plant overrunning the low bushes by the 

 sluggish streams, and covering them thickly 

 with clusters of dull white flowers. I did not 

 remember evej to have seen it before, and on 

 taking it home and examining it found it to be 

 climbing boneset. The flowers are so much 



