THE THISTLE FANHLV. 505 



C. graminifbHa, silver grass, or grass-leaved golden aster, has forme ihc 

 greatest charm Of them all, as it grows perhaps side by side with thr " 

 aster through sandy pine-barrens. Its tall and leafy stem is c<>iisid< ; 

 marked, as is its grass-like foliage, with white, silky and lustrous hairs, giv- 

 ing the plant an intense and silvery sheen. The ratlu.-r small but very at- 

 tractive flower-heads grow on softly woolly anil leafy peduncles, and thus 

 form a spreading corymb. 



PterbcauIo)i pyoiostac/iyiDii. {rialr CI. W 1 1 1.) 



FAMILY COLOUR ODOUR RANGE TIME OF BLOOM 



ritistU-. White. Scentless. Florida to North Carolina. JuMf.July. 



Floiver-heads : growing in compact, oblong and woolly spikes, and com 

 only of tubular flowers. Corolla : five-cleft, f/n'olitcn- : with lanceolate cai . 

 ing scales, imbricated in several rows. Papf^iis : longer than llic iiu-> 

 Leaves : lanceolate, narrowed at the base into margins which extend con>i«i« ; 

 below the point of attachment on the stem ; irregularly dentate ; dark ^i- ■ i.. 

 densely tomentose underneath ; and somewhat woully ow tJie veins. Stem : one to 

 two feet high, simple or rarely branched ; leafy. 



This very strange-looking plant is found, for one place, about .St. 

 Augustine, Fla., although as far northward as the Carolinas it sparingly 

 occurs in the damp, sandy barren strip of country. The hoary, thick white 

 undersides of its leaves are noticeable, and the way the leaves e.vtcnd along 

 the stem, making it appear as though winged, appeals to us as a rathrr un- 

 usual freak in its ccwistruction. 



RAYLESS GOLDEN=ROD. 



Chondrophora midata. 



FAMILY COLOUR ODOUR RANGE TIME OF BLOOM 



Thistle. Yellow. Scentless. Florida to Xe'.u Jersey. .1 Uj^'uit-lKt.UiP . 



Flower-heads: very numerous, growing in compound corvmbose cymes, and 

 composed only of tubular flowers. Corolla : tubular ; five-cleft. Iinoluert : cani- 

 panulate ; narrow, with appressed, yellowish green imbricated bracts. I.e,nef: 

 alternate ; the lower ones spatulate and obtuse, the upper ones linear, .sessile, en- 

 tire. Stem : erect ; one to two and a-half feet high ; simple ; glabrous. 



Although without the conventional rays of golden-rod. the many, tiny 

 tubular flowers of this plant, packed snugly in their llat terminal clusters, form 

 often great patches of yellow, making dull-looking barrens to gleam as if wit!) 

 sunshine. In fact it is only when thus .seen in masses of colour that the 

 plant is beautiful, for its leaves are too distant on the stem to produce much 

 effect. Through the moist barrens it is especially charming when crowding 

 in and about equally vigorous gerardias. 



