262 PLANTS GROWING IN DRY SOIL. 



SnOOTH UPLAND OR SCARLET SUflAC. 



Rhus glabra. 



FAMILY COLOUR ODOUR RANGE TIME OF BLOOM 



^ztmac. IVhite. Scentless. Maine southward to June-August. 



Florida and westward. 



Flowers : growing in compact terminal panicles. Fruit: velvety, crimson 

 hairy berries, clustered in bunches nine to ten inches long ; acid and pleasant 

 to the taste. Leaves: one foot long; odd-pinnate; divided into eleven to 

 thirty-one lanceolate, serrate, glabrous leaflets. A shrub usually four to twelve 

 feet tall, although at times reaching twenty feet high. 



" Still sits the schoolhouse by the road, 



A ragged beggar sunning ; 

 Around it still the sumachs grow 



And blackberry vines are running." — Whittier. 



What an irresistible charm the sumacs must have lent to 

 the little schoolhouse that Whittier tells us about, and how 

 often the girls and boys must have thrust their firm, little fin- 

 gers in among the closely packed bunches of berries. 



R. glabra is our most common species of the fields and 

 waysides and is very decorative in the autumn. The shape of 

 the clusters and their crimson colour at once gain our confi- 

 dence, as it should be remembered that the berries of the poi- 

 sonous species of the swamps, R, Vernix, page 53, are whilish 

 and grow in axillary panicles. 



FIVE=FINGER. COMMON CINQUEFOIL. 



Polentllla Ca7iade7isis. 



Flowers ; small ; solitary ; axillary. Calyx : of five narrow sepals, alternat- 

 ing with an under row of delicately pointed bracts. Corolla : of five rosaceous 

 petals. ^ Stamens ; numerous. Pistils : numerous, forming a head. Leaves : 

 divided into three obovate leaflets, the two lateral ones again divided and mak- 

 ing the five stubby fingers which have suggested its name. Stem : growing 

 close to the ground ; silky. The plant spreads by runners. 



One of our dearest little field blossoms whose cherry yellow 

 head peeps out among the grass in early spring. We find it 



