A BUNCH OF HERBS 203 



sucks up human blood, tobacco. Now if tbey catch, 

 the Colorado beetle of us, it will go far toward pay- 

 ing them off for the rats and the mice, and for other 

 pests in our houses. 



The more attractive and pretty of the British 

 weeds — as the common daisy, of which the poets have 

 made so much, the larkspur, which is a pretty corn- 

 field weed, and the scarlet field-poppy, which flowers 

 all summer, and is so taking amid the ripening 

 grain — have not immigrated to our shores. Like a 

 certain sweet rusticity and charm of European rural 

 life, they do not thrive readily under our skies. 

 Our fleabane has become a common roadside weed 

 in England, and a few other of our native less 

 known plants have gained a foothold in the Old 

 World. Our beautiful jewel- weed has recently ap- 

 peared along certain of the English rivers. 



Pokeweed is a native American, and what a lusty, 

 royal plant it is ! It never invades cultivated fields, 

 but hovers about the borders and looks over the 

 fences like a painted Indian sachem. Thoreau cov- 

 eted its strong purple stalk for a cane, and the 

 robins eat its dark crimson-juiced berries. 



It is commonly believed that the mullein is in- 

 digenous to this country, for have we not heard 

 that it is cultivated in European gardens, and chris- 

 tened the American velvet plant? Yet it, too, 

 seems to have come over with the Pilgrims, and is 

 most abundant in the older parts of the country. 

 It abounds throughout Europe and Asia, and had 

 its economic uses with the ancients. The Greeks 



