MANUAI< OF NATDRie STUDY. 125 



found now-a-days along public highways and waste 

 places. How did it get there ? Collect some wild 

 lettuce and examine the implements for travel 

 through the air. After breaking prairie sod, espec- 

 ially in the low ground, cottonwood shoots spring 

 up quite plentifully, even when there are no trees 

 of that kind within a radius of several miles. How 

 do you account for it ? Examine the provision that 

 nature has made for floating the seeds and find 

 your answer in that. 



The first jimson weeds in America sprang up 

 with the tobacco around Jamestown, early in the 

 1 7th century. Where did they come from ? How ? 

 To-day they are found in many rubbish piles and 

 hog lots all over America. How do you account 

 for such a widespread distribution ? Here, again, 

 an examination of the burr should be given. What 

 other seeds are distributed in like manner? The 

 pupils will name cockle-burr, Spanish needle, beg- 

 gar lice, many achenia such as buttercup, hepatica, 

 anemone, etc. 



Prof. D. S. Kelly, of Jeffersonville, Indiana, fur- 

 nishes the following interesting account of weed 

 distribution in the west : 



" Not until a few years ago was the Solanum ro- 

 stratum found east of Colorado; but when travel 

 began eastward along the old trails through Kansas, 



