532 



THE THISTLE FAMILY. 



pine-barrens, and unfolds early enough in the season to see many little har- 

 bingers of spring both bloom and perish. Its achenes are linear, and the 

 pappus, a series of barbed, stiff bristles, well supplies them with a means of 

 being carried along to a good germinating ground. Of course, millions and 

 millions of seeds that have been matured never do reach fertile spots wherein 

 they may grow ; but weighing well the desperate chances and hair-breadth 

 escapes they run, Nature must necessarily provide the seeds in super- 

 abundance. 



SWEET=SCENTED INDIAN PLANTAIN. 



Synosma snaveolens. 



FAMILY COLOUR ODOUR RANGE TIME OF BLOOM 



Thistle. White or pinkish. Siveet-scented. Florida northward. August-October. 



Floiver-heads : growing in abundant, terminal corymbs and composed entirely 

 of tubular, perfect flowers. Corolla: five-cleft, //zz^t'/w^r^ ; cylindric, with numer- 

 ous lanceolate bracts. Acheiies : oblong. Pappus: bristly. Leaves: alternate; 

 hastate, pointed at the apex and tapering at the base into winged petioles, or the 

 upper ones ovate and serrate; doubly and sharply serrate. Stem : three to five 

 feet high; grooved; leafy; smooth. 



Mesadenia atriplicifblia, pale Indian plantain, wild caraway, grows 

 through woods in inland places from Florida to North Carolina and west- 

 ward. A notable peculiarity of the genus Mesadenia, a group of about twelve 

 species closely related to Synosma, is that while the flower-heads have a fiat 

 receptacle there is in the centres a fleshy little projection, somewhat like a 

 tuber ; and it is in reference to this fact that the Greek name was bestowed. 



RAGWORT, {Plate CLXXVL) 

 Senecio millefblium, 



FAMILY COLOUR ODOUR RANGE TIME OF BLOOM 



Thistle. Orange. Scentless. Mountains 0/ North Carolina, June. 



Floiver-heads : growing on bracted peduncles in compound, terminal corymbs 

 and having both radiate and tubular flowers. Rays: nine to twelve. Disk 

 Jloivers : \\\\\\^ tubular corollas, five-toothed. Involucre: campanulate. Stylt'- 

 branches : s\)ve?id\\\g. /^t-//t'//f.f .• with a pappus of white, fluffy bristles. Leaves: 

 tufted about the base and alternate on the stem; lanceolate, and bipinnately 

 divided into fine linear and toothed segments. Stem : one to two feet high, woolly 

 when young, but smooth at maturity. 



We cannot ignore the ragworts, for they have a wide distribution over 

 the globe, and the genus is one that numbers not less than a thousand 

 species. In America we must claim them as native weeds. They spread 

 over the country great masses of golden yellow and yet get themselves 

 greatly disliked through their reputation for causing hay fever. In almost 

 every soil they thrive and appear in their various forms like many other 



