288 CONCERNING ASTERS 



The Asters look something like Daisies, because 

 their flower-heads are filled in the centers with tiny 

 flowers in the shape of tubes, and around their 

 edges are long narrow ones. I think, though, that 

 the centers of Asters are not nearly so hard as the 

 yellow eyes of Daisies; and that the flowers around 

 their centers are more the shape of bits of string 

 than little straps. 



Most often Asters look like small bushes with 

 branches in different directions. The white ones 

 do not all grow in the same way. Neither are 

 the purple ones all alike. Some white Asters are 

 small, and others are large, and there are others 

 besides that are a size in between the large and 

 small ones. But there are not nearly so many 

 white Asters as there are blue and purple ones. 



There is one little white Aster that grows in 

 a great many places and is just as fond of road- 

 sides as it is of dry fields ; it has very small flower- 

 heads covering its branches so thickly that they 

 sometimes bend them over like fairies' wands. I 

 can hardly tell which one of its names I like best, 

 it has so many. 



Aster means a star, yet this one looks like ever 

 so many stars. Professor Bonn usually calls it 

 either White Heath Aster, or White Rosemary. 

 Tommy calls it Farewell Summer, because it comes 

 so late that he thinks it is waving the summer 

 away. Philip's name for it is Frostweed, which 

 is not nearly so pretty I think as Michaelmas 



