92 FLOWERS OF FIELD, HILL, AND SWAMP 



3. Poverty-grass 



Hudsbnia tomentosa. — Family, Rock-rose. Color, yellow. 

 Leaves, bristly, awl-shaped, small, growing thickly on the stem. 

 Time, May, June. 



Petals, 5, falling after a day's time. 



Flowers, very small, borne among the leaves near the tops of 

 the branches; sessile or with short peduncles. This plant grows 

 a few inches high, in a close and bushy fashion, heather-like, in 

 sand along the dunes or on the edges of pine woods. 



Another species, H. ericoldes, differs in one particular — that the 

 flowers are borne on slender long peduncles. 



" In some parts the two species of poverty-grass {Hudsonia to- 

 mentosa and ericoides), which deserve a better name, reign for 

 miles in little hemispherical tufts or islets, like moss scattered 

 over the waste. 



" In summer, if the poverty-grass grows at the head of a hollow 

 looking towards the sea, in a bleak position where the wind 

 rushes up, the northern or exposed half of the tuft is sometimes 

 all black and dead, like an oven-broom, while the opposite half is 

 yellow with blossoms, the whole hillside thus presenting a re- 

 markable contrast when seen from the poverty-stricken and the 

 flourishing side." — Thoreau's " Cape Cod." 



4. Pinweed 



Lechea thymifblia. — Family, Rock-rose. Cb/rjr, greenish 

 or purplish. Leaves, opposite, some whorled, long, narrow. 

 Time, summer. 



Sepals, 5, one longer than the others. Petals, 3. Stamens, 

 many. ' Pistil bears 3 feather-like stigmas. 



This is a plant of rather stout growth, about 2 feet high, 

 loosely branching, with dull, insignificant flowers in a loose, 

 leafy panicle. The leaves are broad and thin, and the entire 

 plant is somewhat hairy. In dry ground near the coast, from 

 Massachusetts to Florida. 



