90 NATURE IN A CITY YARD 



be explained, for the enlightenment of 

 the very few who don't know, that the 

 name is a corruption of Jamestown weed, 

 as the plant spread itself liberally over the 

 site of Jamestown, Virginia, after that town 

 had been burned in 1676, as the only way 

 to keep the scampish and dunderheaded 

 Berkeley out of the place. How this par- 

 ticular weed got into our premises nobody 

 knows ; but without warning or planting it 

 just came up and grew. There is none 

 other within a thousand feet of us, I should 

 say ; the wind certainly did not carry the 

 seeds, and I should not suppose that birds 

 would, either, for they are poison at 

 least to featherless bipeds. And being 

 there, I made the best of it, and before 

 cool weather set in it had become an ex- 

 hibition. But I find that others have dis- 

 covered it as a flower, for a seedsman's 

 catalogue, lately arrived, sets forth the 

 merits of Datura Stramonium, which is an 

 alias for the humble jimson. It likewise 

 rejoices in the name of thorn-apple in some 

 localities. 



" Hello ! You Ve got a castor-oil plant 



