96 The Fringe of the Road 



has selected a special group of characteristic way- 

 side plants, which were almost dust-proof until the 

 motor-car made a new thing of dust. Except for 

 the green grass itself, these characteristic plants 

 of the wayside turf are either dust-like in colour or 

 marked by a wiry hardihood of growth which fits 

 them even more thoroughly for life in the high- 

 way's heat and glare. The common white clover is 

 one of the most persistent flowers of the roadside 

 fringe ; and the slightly tarnished white of its 

 blossoms is perfectly fitted for giving variety to the 

 dull green of the turf, while risking no such bright- 

 ness as the dust would swiftly destroy. Even more 

 thoroughly at home in the dry gutters and at the 

 edge of the thirsty sward is the creeping silverweed, 

 with its fringed, hoary leaves and golden, straw- 

 berry-like flowers. This hardy little plant is 

 wonderfully contrived to clothe the dried mud of 

 the summer roadsides with a light film of sun- 

 loving vegetation. It flings its stems along the 

 surface of the earth in May, and opens by mid- 

 summer its flattened golden blossoms in the full 

 eye of the sun. Its delicate leaves have the 

 same grey, dust-like bloom which is borne as 

 a protection by many plants of the hottest hill- 

 sides and shingle-ridges, such as the lavender, 

 and the olive, and the horned sea-poppy. Among 

 the most typical of the wirier plants of such 

 dusty waysides are the hedge mustard, the ver- 

 vain or wild verbena, and the purple-flowered 

 bartsia, which lifts by the August and Septem- 

 ber roadsides its comb of blossoms all set on 



