LEGUMINOSAE (PULSE FAMILY) 219 
depths through a mass of stringy feeding fibers, also black. With 
such a food reserve, no wonder it is able to send up yearly such a 
quantity of growth above ground; for each plant is a collection of 
many woody stalks, three to six feet tall, erect, slender, pale green, 
round, smooth, or slightly grooved at base; when young, both 
stems and leaf-stalks may be slightly hairy. Leaves alternate and 
set rather far apart, pinnately compound, with five to nine pairs of 
smooth, oblong leaflets, dark green above and paler below, the 
edges entire and the midvein extending beyond the rounded tip in a 
bristly point ; petioles short, yellow, grooved on the upper side, and 
having a prominent, club-shaped gland set just above the swollen 
base. Flowers bright yellow, springing in many loose clusters 
from the upper axils; calyx-lobes five, very narrow and reflexed ; 
five unequal petals, three close together at the top, the two below 
larger and spreading; ten yellow stamens with filaments of dif- 
fering lengths, tipped with brown anthers of differing sizes, the 
three lowermost ones largest. Pods about three inches long, flat, 
curved, slightly constricted between the seeds, hairy when young 
but becoming smooth as they ripen, and turning to a dark reddish 
brown. Seeds flat, dark brown, usually four to eight in a pod, 
possessed of very long vitality when in the soil. A Wild Senna 
plant in bloom has a look of elegance, as though it cared for its 
own fine appearance. Grazing animals leave it undisturbed, or if 
scarcity of forage drive them to browse its leaves they suffer from 
“scours” as it has a strong cathartic action. It is one of the 
medicinal plants, and its leaflets, stripped from their stalks at 
flowering time and carefully dried, may be sold in the drug market 
for six to eight cents a pound. 
Means of control 
If the plants are few they may be grubbed out, but if plentiful 
this would be a task for Hercules. Cutting close to the ground at 
the time of bloom, repeating the operation as the roots send up more 
stalks, will finally exhaust their vitality ; but the treatment must be 
so persistent as to allow no opportunity for storing fresh nutriment. 
Dry salt on the cut surfaces will help to check new growth; or the 
plants may be wholly and promptly destroyed by the use of 
caustic soda or hot brine about the roots, leaving the ground 
barren for a season. 
