ERIGERON BELLIDIFOLIUM.— POOR ROBIN'S PLANTAIN, 87 
“ Cold blew the bitter-biting north 
Upon thy humble birth; 
Yet cheerfully thou venturest forth 
Amid the storm, 
Scarce reared above the earth 
Thy tender form.” 
The writer has: gathered flowers of this daisy-like species 
among the snow in a late spring. The generic name, Evigeron, 
according to Milne, is “ from ey, the spring, and geron, the Greek 
name for senecio; that is, a senecio which flowers in spring.” It 
may be observed that gevoz really means an old man, as its Lat- 
inized form sezecto does—from sezex, old,—and this is in allusion 
to the copious white pappus often in globose masses like a head 
of white silken hair. But Z77gerons do not all bloom in spring. 
There is another species, LZrigeron Philadelphicum, which is very 
closely allied to this, one of the chief differences being that while 
our present subject is often in bloom by the end of April, and is 
rarely found in blossom after June, the £. Philadelphicum does 
not commence to open its flowers till June, and often continues 
till August at least in Pennsylvania. The creeping runners or 
stolons (Fig. 3) also distinguish this species, the £. Philadct- 
phicum always having a tufted root stock. While on this sub- 
ject of botanical differences, it may be noted that in many 
genera of composite plants it is very easy to distinguish one from 
another by something in its aspect which is very hard to define 
in words. ‘The practised collector can almost always tell an 
Erigeron when he meets with it for the first time, the very large 
number of ray florets being in a great measure a character- 
istic. Yet the botanist, when he comes to analyze the struc- 
ture closely, finds it difficult to tell how to distinguish it from an 
Aster, a Diplopappus or some of the other neighboring genera. 
Some of the species, indeed, have a double pappus, as in the last- 
named genus, especially those which bloom in the fall season, 
about the time when Diplopappus is generally found, and in these 
cases the appendages of the style, shorter and blunter than in 
Diplopappus, form all beyond the “popular aspect” that is relied 
