98 Field, Forest, and Wayside Flowers 
rophyll is to be found in stems and foliage. The 
mistletoe is still of a dingy or yellowish-green, 
because it has not yet sunk to the lowest depths 
of shiftlessness. It steals its food from the tree 
upon which it grows, but steals it in an undi- 
gested or half-digested state, and does its own di- 
gesting. The yellow-rattle and the pretty painted- 
cup practice a like sort of thieving. Their roots 
draw moisture from the roots of their next neigh- 
bors, instead of taking it direct from the soil. 
But the sap thus appropriated cannot be used 
in the building of vegetable tissue till it has been 
worked over in the leaves, and as yellow-rattle 
and painted-cup make use of their foliage, they 
have retained it. 
There is a lower depth of parasitism than this, 
in which the plant steals digested food from its 
victim. When this stage of degradation is reached 
the foliage of the parasite dwindles, and its green 
color disappears. We have seven or eight native 
plants which suck their food, already prepared, 
from the roots of herbs and trees. They are rep- 
resentatives of three widely-differing botanical 
families, but similarity of practice has brought 
about among them a certain similarity of aspect, 
so that we may almost say that there is a rogue 
