ASTER CONYZOIDES 361 
to me ten or more species are known.” Gesner was also an early 
example of that true scientific patience which waits for another 
season’s growth in order to determine a Composite species ; for to 
one who sent him a fasciate Cichorium as a new species, he gave 
directions “ futura aestate diligentius observabis,” for said he, “if 
from its seed another plant like itself is produced, you may sup- 
pose it to be natural ; if not, it is not a natural species.” 
Gesner also held an attentive ear to the plant-names of the 
people——though not always without error in identification, as 
appears the case in his Wagstroh, which he names as vernacular * 
for Aster Atticus, a name meaning way-straw, wayside-straw, 
(English bedstraw), reported by Bock in 1531 for a Galium, which 
Galium was doubtless, like its relative Asperula, mistaken for 
Aster by some one who reported its name to Gesner as an Aster- 
name. 
“ Gesner’s Aster.’’—By this term we may distinguish the plant 
long known as Aster conyzoides Gesneri,+ and which passed as a 
* See his De stirpium collectione Tabulae, which first appeared as an Appendix, pp. 
467-548, to Gesner’s edition of Kyber’s Lexicon rei herbariae, Strasburg, 15533 
Teprinted under name of Caspar Wolf as editor, Zur., 1587 (ex 470/. Colu. ). 
t The known history of Aster conyzoides Gesneri may be briefly sketched as nd 
described as Conizoides by Gesner, 1561. It appeared, in Lobel's 
“Plantarum Historia” or « Observationes,’’ Plantin press, Antwerp, 1576 ; (P- bas 
ig libris Bu.) with figure, p. 188, a figure of the whole plant, reduced to five or six 
Inches, showing nine heads resembling those of Evrigeron Philadelphicum L., the figure 
being entitled «<4s/ey conyzoides Gesneri,’’ and with the following description : 
** ASTER CONYZOIDES, CONYZOIDES GESNERI. 
glia, Belgio et agro Louaniensi juxt lemiae | ia freq sagimonelnste 
liis et surculis dodrantalibus, interdum et majoribus Conyzae minimae. Flores 
"Th An 
facie, fo 
ing anything new. as 
It is perhaps +e ¥ Fifth kind’ of “ Starrewort’? mentioned by Gerarde in sy 
Herball, 393 (1597), but without figure, and simply with the remarks «There is 
— Sort [of Aster] that hath 9 broune stalke, with leaves like the small gene? 
The flowers are of a dark yellow which turne into downe that flieth away with the win 
Coniza, The roote is full of threds or strings.’ 
4h 1616 Fabio Colonna in his Ecphrasis, 2: 25, 
MM alii Asterem Conisoidem appellarunt.’”’ 
> 
referred to it as ‘ palustri Amello, 
