White and Greenish 



with the minimum loss of time, each head in a cluster containing, 

 as it does, from ten to sixteen restaurants. An ant crawling up 

 the stem is usually discouraged by its hairs long before reaching 

 the sweets. Sometimes the stem appears to run through the 

 centre of one large leaf that is kinky in the middle and taper- 

 pointed at both ends, rather than between a pair of leaves. 



An old-fashioned illness known as break-bone fever doubt- 

 less paralleled to-day by the grippe once had its terrors for a 

 patient increased a hundredfold by the certainty he felt of taking 

 nauseous doses of boneset tea, administered by zealous old women 

 outside the "regular practice." Children who had to have their 

 noses held before they would or, indeed, could swallow the 

 decoction, cheerfully munched boneset taffy instead. 



The bright white, wide-spread inflorescence of the White 

 Snakeroot, White or Indian Sanicle, or Deerwort Boneset (. 

 ageratoides) is displayed from July to November in the hope of 

 getting relief from the fiercest competition for the visits of but- 

 terflies, honey and other small bees, wasps, and flies. From July 

 to September the vast army of composites appear in such hope- 

 less predominance that prolonged bloom on the part of any of their 

 number is surely an advantage. In the rich, moist woods, or by 

 shady roadsides, where it prefers to dwell, the white sanicle 

 makes a fine show. Above its fringy bloom how often one sees 

 the exquisite little lavender-blue butterflies (Lyccena pseudargiolus) 

 pausing an instant to drain the tiny cups of nectar, and usually 

 transferring pollen from the protruding styles (see p. 148) as they 

 flit to another cluster. 



The opposite, petioled leaves, broadly oval at the base, taper- 

 pointed, coarsely toothed, three-nerved, and veiny, are thin and 

 easily skeletonized by the insects that enjoy the leaves of all this 

 clan of plants. From one to four feet high, the White Snakeroot 

 grows in the United States and Canada as far west as Nebraska. 



Closely allied to the eupatoriums, and with similar inflores- 

 cence, is the Climbing Boneset or Hempweed (Willughbaea scan- 

 dens) Mikania scandens of Gray. Straggling over bushes in 

 swamps, by the brookside thicket, or in moist, shady roadsides, 

 the vine reveals its kinship to the boneset instantly it comes into 

 bloom in midsummer, although its flower clusters are occasion- 

 ally pinkish. The opposite, petioled leaves are quite different 

 from the boneset's, however, being heart-shaped at the base, 

 and taper-pointed, somewhat triangular, two to four inches 

 long, and one or two inches wide. From Massachusetts and 

 the Middle States even to South America and the West Indies is 

 its range. 



262 



