PRINCE'S FEATHER 



PRIHCE'S FEATHER 



Polygonum orientate. 



Polygonum, Greek for many-kneed; from the swollen joints of the 

 stem. 



A tall-growing, branching annual, perhaps the best garden repre- 

 sentative of the polygonums. Sparingly escaped into waste grounds; 

 native to India. Summer. 



Stem. — Three to four feet high, hairy, branching above, bearing 

 long, slender, nodding spikes of bright rose-pink flowers. 



Leaves. — Alternate, large, ovate, or oblong, entire, pointed, dis- 

 tinctly petioled; with stipules in the 

 form of sheaths above the swollen 

 joints of the stem. 



Flowers. — Rose-pink or flesh-color, 

 in close cylindrical spikes arranged in 

 open panicles. 



Calyx. — ^Deep-rose, four to five 

 parted, persistent. 



Corolla. — Wanting. 



Stamens. — Seven, exserted. 



Ovary. — Flat, one-celled; style two- 

 cleft. 



Fruit. — A lenticular shining akene, 

 surrounded by the rose-colored caljoc. 



The Polygonums, knovsTi chiefly 

 by two weeds — the Knot-Grass and 

 the Smartweed — have few repre- 

 sentatives in the garden. The one 

 to which least exception can be 



made is Prince's Feather, an inmate of old-time gardens and 

 often self-sown in the new, but rarely planted there. It is of 

 the same type as our native species, particularly Polygonum 

 pennsylvdnicum, but taller, with rosier flowers in longer spikes. 

 There are so many better flowers, it does not seem vKorth 

 while to give garden space to so ineffective a plant, as it neither 



109 



Prince's Feather. Polygonum orientale 



