210 PEPACTON 



and the honey-bee gathers much pollen from it. 

 The ox-eye daisy makes a fair quality of hay if 

 cut before it gets ripe. The cows will eat the 

 leaves of the burdock and the stinging nettles of 

 the woods. But what cannot a cow's tongue stand ? 

 She will crop the poison ivy with impunity, and I 

 think would eat thistles if she found them growing 

 in the garden. Leeks and garlics are readily eaten 

 by cattle in the spring, and are said to be medicinal 

 to them. Weeds that yield neither pasturage for 

 bee nor herd, yet afford seeds to the fall and winter 

 birds. This is true of most of the obnoxious weeds 

 of the garden and of thistles. The wild lettuce 

 yields down for the hummingbird's nest, and the 

 flowers of whiteweed are used by the kingbird and 

 cedar-bird. 



Yet it is pleasant to remember that, in our cli- 

 mate, there are no weeds so persistent and lasting 

 and universal as grass. Grass is the natural cover- 

 ing of the fields. There are but four weeds that I 

 know of — milkweed, live-forever, Canada thistle, 

 and toad-flax — ^ that it will not run out in a good 

 soil. We crop it and mow it year after year ; and 

 yet, if the season favors, it is sure to come again. 

 Kelds that have never known the plow, and never 

 been seeded by man, are yet covered with grass. 

 And in human nature, too, weeds are by no means 

 in the ascendant, troublesome as they are. The 

 good green grass of love and truthfulness and com- 

 mon sense are more universal, and crowd the idle 

 weeds to the wall. 



