Yellow and Orange 



ole, whose edges may be cut like fringe. In dry, rocky soil this 

 is, perhaps, the first and last golden-rod to bloom, having been 

 found as early as June, and sometimes lasting into November. 

 Range, from North Carolina and Missouri very far north. 



West of the Mississippi how beautiful are the dry prairies in 

 autumn with the Missouri Golden-rod (S. Missouriensis), its short, 

 broad, spreading panicle waving at the summit of a smooth, slen- 

 der stem from two to five feet tall. Its firm, rather thick leaves 

 are lance-shaped, triple-nerved, entire, very rough-margined, or 

 perhaps the lowest ones with a few scattered teeth. 



Perhaps the commonest of all the lovely clan east of the 

 Mississippi, or throughout a range extending from Arizona and 

 Florida northward to British Columbia and New Brunswick, is 

 the Canada Golden-rod or Yellow-weed (S. Canadensis). Surely 

 everyone must be familiar with the large, spreading, dense-flow- 

 ered panicle, with recurved sprays, that crowns a rough, hairy stem 

 sometimes eight feet tall, or again only two feet. Its lance- 

 shaped, acutely pointed, triple-nerved leaves are rough, and the 

 lower ones saw-edged. From August to November one cannot 

 fail to find it blooming in dry soil. (Illustration, p. 362.) 



Most brilliantly colored of its tribe is the low-growing Gray 

 or Field Golden-rod or Dyer's Weed (5. nemoralis). The rich, 

 deep yellow of its little spreading, recurved, and usually one- 

 sided panicles is admirably set off by the ashy gray, or often 

 cottony, stem, and the hoary, grayish-green leaves in the open, 

 sterile places where they arise from July to November. Quebec 

 and the Northwest Territory to the Gulf States. 



No longer classed as a true Solidago, but the type of a distinct 

 genus, the Lance-leaved (formerly S. lanceolata), Bushy, or Fra- 

 grant Golden-rod {Euthamia graminifolia) lifts its flat-topped, 

 tansy-like, fragrant clusters of flower-heads from two to four feet 

 above moist ground. From July to September it transforms whole 

 river-banks, low fields, and roadsides into a veritable El Dorado. 

 Its numerous leaves are very narrow, lance-shaped, triple or five 

 nerved, uncut, sometimes with a few resinous dots. Range, from 

 New Brunswick to the Gulf, and westward to Nebraska. 



"Along the roadside, like the flowers of gold 

 That tawny Incas for their gardens wrought. 

 Heavy with sunshine droops the golden-rod." 



Bewildered by the multitude of species, and wondering at 

 the enormous number of representatives of many of them, we 

 cannot but inquire into the cause of such triumphal conquest of a 

 continent by a single genus. Much is explained simply in the 

 statement that golden-rods belong to the vast order of Compositae, 

 flowers in reality made up sometimes of hundreds of minute florets 

 united into a far-advanced socialistic community having for its 

 motto, " In union there is strength." (See Daisy, p. 270.) In the 



351 



