HAWKWEED. 



HAY. 



ceous plants of easy culture. The indigenous 

 species found in Britain are four. 



The autumnal hawkbit (Jl. autumnalis) is a 

 very common and troublesome weed in all 

 meadows and pastures. It varies very much 

 in luxuriance, and is often found thriving in 

 extremely poor land newly turned up. The 

 root is abrupt, with very long, simple, lateral 

 fibres. Leaves several, almost entirely radi- 

 cal, lanceolate, deeply and unequally toothed 

 or pinnatifid. The stalks are several, ascend- 

 ing or spreading, branched, from 6 to 18 inches 

 high. Each stalk is hollow internally, contain- 

 ing a loose, white, cottony tuft. The flowers 

 are bright yellow, not large, often reddish un- 

 derneath. As these are all perennial weeds 

 and encumber the ground, they should be root- 

 ed up in spring. (Eng. Flor. vol. iii. p. 350.) 



HAWKWEED (Hieracium, from kierax, a 

 hawk, being supposed to sharpen the sight of 

 birds of prey). A very numerous perennial 

 genus, generally inhabiting mountainous or 

 woody situations. They are, for the most part, 

 pretty flowering plants, with yellow blossoms, 

 but a great number are mere weeds. The 

 herbage, in general, is milky, and more or less 

 bitter ; but these qualities are, in some in- 

 stances, hardly perceptible. The dwarf her- 

 baceous kinds'are remarkably adapted for rock 

 work, or the front of flower borders, the taller 

 kinds at the back ; they may be increased by 

 seeds, or divisions. The annual species need 

 only be sown in the open border. 



Sir J. E. Smith describes no less than eight- 

 een distinct indigenous species, which it would 

 carry me too far into detail to particularize. 



Ten or twelve species of hieracium have 

 been found by botanists in the United States, 

 and 14 in the British provinces. One called 

 the veined hieracium, or hawkweed (H. veno- 

 swm), is a frequent plant in clearings and 

 woodlands in New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and 

 other Middle States, where it flowers in May 

 and June. It has a perennial root, and stem 

 1 to 2 feet high. A few years since, this plant 

 was announced as a certain antidote against 

 the poison of the rattlesnake. But its specific 

 virtues need to be further tested before they 

 can be regarded as fully proven. A great 

 many specifics and antidotes are vaunted by 

 credulous, or designing persons, for the poison 

 of reptiles as well as the bite of a mad dog, 

 and persons who have taken them and escaped 

 any serious mischief, have led others to believe 

 in the virtues of the remedies when the pa- 

 tients would have recovered without. In this 

 way the most inert and inefficient prescriptions 

 often get the credit of what properly belongs 

 to the agency of common homely appliances, 

 or the wonderful restora^ve powers with which 

 a kind Providence has endowed both man and 

 beast. 



HAWTHORN, WHITETHORN, or MAY 

 (Mespilus oxyacantha}. A common small tree, 

 or shrub, but beautiful in its appearance, and 

 fragrant in odour. The hawthorn grows al- 

 most everywhere in thickets, copses, hedges, 

 and high open fields. The wood is very hard, 

 with a smooth, blackish bark, and, like the 

 whitebeam hawthorn (Pyrus aria), is converted 

 into axle trees and handles of tools. The 

 G06 



branches have lateral, sharp, awl-shaped 

 thorns. The leaves are alternate, deciduous, 

 on longish, slender stalks ; smooth, deep-green, 

 veiny, an inch or two long, tapering at the base, 

 or wedge-shaped, and more or less deeply three- 

 lobed, with crescent-shaped stipules. The 

 flowers are corymbose, terminal, white, occa- 

 sionally pink or almost scarlet. The fruit 

 (called haws) is mealy, insipid, dark red, occa- 

 sionally yellow, furrowed externally, and very 

 hard. Birds are fed with the fruit all the win- 

 ter long; but the haws maybe more usefully 

 employed in fattening hogs. In Kamschatka 

 they are eaten by the peasants, and fermented 

 into wine. The common hawthorn blows in 

 May, and can be propagated from seed, which 

 must be kept in sand through the winter, and 

 sown in spring. The young plants will be fit 

 to place out in two years. There are several 

 varieties of this species, among others the 

 celebrated Glastonbury thorn, which blossoms 

 sometimes as early as Christmas. The double 

 blossomed hawthorn is one of the greatest or- 

 naments of our pleasure-grounds, whether it 

 be kept as a shrub, or trained as a tree. 



The yellow-berried hawthorn, which was 

 originally brought from Virginia, has a double 

 recommendation to the shrubbery, for its buds 

 are of a fine yellow in the spring, and its fruit, 

 which is of the colour of pure gold, hang on 

 the branches nearly the whole of the winter, 

 giving great variety to the plantation. Ever- 

 greens should never be planted without a few 

 of these shrubs being intermixed to enliven 

 them in the winter months. The hawthorn is 

 peculiarly adapted for small lawns or paddocks, 

 where larger trees cannot be admitted. When 

 standing singly, the hawthorn often reaches to 

 the height of 25 or 30 feet, with a trunk from 

 4 to 8 feet in circumference. 



In husbandry, these shrubs are called quick- 

 sets; and when kept well cut, they form hedges, 

 scarcely less impregnable than those composed 

 of holly. The clipping of hedges and trim- 

 ming of trees is certainly advantageous to the 

 farmer, although it adds nothing to the beauty 

 of rural scenery. Hawthorn hedges appear to 

 have come into use, in England, about the time 

 of Charles II.; as Evelyn observes in his Sylva, 

 "I have been told of a gentleman who has 

 considerably improved his revenue, by sowing 

 haws only and raising nurseries of quicksets, 

 which he sells by the hundred, far and near. 

 This is a commendable industry, and any neg- 

 lected corner of ground will fit this plantation." 

 See THORN. 



HAY (Germ, heu, Du. Aovi). Any kind of 

 grass cut and dried as fodder for cattle. Hay 

 constitutes the chief dependence of the farmer 

 and others as winter food for their horses and 

 cattle. The sale of hay within the bills of 

 mortality, and 30 miles round the cities of 

 London and Westminster, is regulated by the 

 act 36 Geo. 3, c. 88. It enacts, that all hay 

 shall be sold by the load of 36 trusses, each 

 truss weighing 56 Ibs., except new hay, which 

 is to weigh 60 Ibs. till the 4th of September, 

 and afterwards 56 Ibs. only ; so that till the 4th 

 of September, a load of hay weighs exactly a 

 ton, but thereafter only 18 cwt. There are 

 three public markets in the metropolis for the 



