EARTH COVERINGS 



281 



coloring in summer and winter. A little far- 

 ther back from the marsh, often quite close 

 to it, are those dryer lands that grow tall 

 grasses and weeds which are sometimes cut to 

 make what is called " salt meadow hay." They 

 do not make a strikingly beautiful growth, 

 though they wave quite prettily in the wind, nor 

 is the color of them in any way remarkable. 

 Still farther back lie the pasture-lands and 

 meadows where the ordinary field-grasses grow, 

 and these are, perhaps, the most common of all 

 the earth coverings. 



There are some thirty-five hundred species 

 of the grass family, ranging from the tall stalk 

 of the bamboos to the small, almost moss-like 

 buffalo grass of the plains. In the picturesque 

 landscape they all have their place, not because 

 they are different members of a botanical 

 family and show slight variation in form and 

 growth, but because they are all masses of fibre 

 and color that carpet the open spots of the 

 globe and lend to universal beauty. Nature 

 did not, perhaps, grow them so much for pict- 

 uresque effect as for use. They are the pro- 

 tectors of the soil from denudation by rains and 

 frost. Wherever the surface of the earth is 

 left bare, nature immediately starts the growth 



