STUDIES OF PLANT LIFE 



SWEET-GALE Myrica Gale (L.). 



This sweet-scented low shrub may be found bordering the 

 rocky shores of our inland Northern lakes in great abun- 

 dance, and may be readily recognized by its bluish dull- 

 green leaves and the fine scent of the plant. The leaves 

 when stirred or crushed give out a fine aroma resembling 

 that of the Sweet-fern, Comptonia asplenifolia, but of higher 

 flavor. The sterile catkins, closely clustered, appear 

 before the leaves; the seed is contained in rough scaly 

 heads; the leaves are toothed at the edges, broader at the 

 upper end and narrowing at the base. The whole bush 

 scarcely exceeds four feet in height, but throws out many 

 small branches, forming a close hedge-like thicket near 

 the margins of lakes and ponds, those lonely inland waters, 

 where, undisturbed for ages, it has flourished and sent forth 

 its sweetness on the desert air " just for itself and God." 

 Yet the qualities of this shrub have not been quite over- 

 looked by the native Indians and by some of the old inhabi- 

 tants of the back country, who use the leaves in home-made 

 diet drinks and in infusions for purifying the blood. 



As the luxuries of civilization creep in among the settlers, 

 they abandon the uses of many of the medicinal herbs that 

 formerly supplied the place of drugs from stores. The old 

 simplers and herbalists are a cult now nearly extinct. I 

 am inclined to agree with a statement I once heard, to the 

 effect that hot stoves and doctors' drugs have fostered or 

 introduced many of the diseases that carry our young people 

 to an early grave and have rendered the old ones prema- 

 turely infirm. 



NEW JERSEY TEA REDROOT Ceanothus Americanus (L.). 



There is an historical interest attached to the name of 

 this very attractive shrub which still lingers in the memories 

 of the descendants of the U. E. Loyalists in Canada and in 



158 



