ii6 



NATURE STUDY AND LIFE 



stinkwort, stinkweed, Jamestown lily, white man's plant 

 (by the Indians).] This is a rank ill-smelling weed, 

 common in vacant lots, rubbish heaps, roadsides, and 

 waste places. It is a stout, bushy annual with coarse, 

 smooth stems, two to five feet high, and large flaccid 

 leaves. The flowers are white (or purplish), shaped some- 

 what like a morning-glory, " heavy scented," from two to 

 four inches long, and appear from May to September (the 

 fruit ripening from August to November), according to 

 latitude. The fruit is a large, con- 

 spicuous, prickly, four-valved pod 

 containing great numbers of dark 

 roughened seeds. 



Cases of poisoning arise from 

 the use of the plant as a stimulant 

 or medicine, from children eating 

 the seeds or playing with the 

 flowers (holding them in their 

 mouths), and with cattle from eat- 

 ing the plants in hay. The jimson 

 weed should be much better known, 

 and no child should permit one to 

 ripen its innumerable seeds. 



Caper Spurge, Euphorbia lathyris. 

 — (Garden spurge, mole plant, 

 gopher plant, wolf's milk, springwort.) This spurge is a 

 garden, roadside, and pasture perennial, common over 

 most of the United States and Canada. The milky juice 

 is extremely acrid, and the fruit is poisonous. Women 

 and children are often poisoned by handling the plant or 

 by getting the juice on tlif- hands or face. 



Fig. 52. Dwarf Larkspur 



