As a messenger the wind is wasteful, and so 

 the pines, to perpetuate their species on earth, 

 must produce vast quantities of pollen. 



In the flowering season of the pines the air is 

 filled with tiny grains of yellow dust, the ponds 

 are covered with a golden scum, and one sees 

 evidences of pine pollen everywhere. This 

 pollen is shed from small tassels which occur 

 at the base of the green shoots that form the 

 current year's growth. Upon the under side 

 of each scale of every cone is a tiny bag of 

 jelly. When a pollen grain flies that way and 

 gets stuck in this little bed of jelly, the scale 

 closes up so as to be water — and even air — 

 tight. Some of the. pine species even varnish 

 the openings so as to make them safe. Within 

 this cozy chamber the miracle of life is con- 

 summated, and ere long there is a small seed, 

 with its wing attached, mature and awaiting 

 the day when the friendly wind will carry it 

 to where it can plant itself and grow up into a 

 big tree. 



When the cone dies, the seeds it harbors live 

 on. During the winter months the squirrels 

 improve every fair day to gather pine seeds 

 for their present needs and their future wants. 

 If you have ever watched a squirrel open up a 

 pine cone, you have wondered how he learned 

 so well the art of getting the seeds out easily. 

 He handles the cone as adeptly as a trained 

 athlete might handle a weight. He takes it in 

 his fore feet, hurls it bottom upward, as if he 

 were a professional juggler, and then begins 

 to gnaw at the base of the lowest row of cells. 

 Presently an opening reveals a seed or two. 

 Thus he goes around and around the cone, 

 taking each scale in its order, and before you 

 could do it by hand he has unlocked every one 

 of them. 



The cones the squirrels do not get hang on 

 as if they were the "pimmerly plums" of Uncle 

 Remus' story. But when the first faint evi- 

 dences appear that the balmy warmth of spring 

 is to succeed the icy breath of winter, there 

 comes a popping and a cracking in the pine 

 forest, and the seasoned woodsman knows that 

 it is the cones firing salutes of welcome to the 

 approaching spring. As the months pass on, 

 one by one the cones dry out, the bended bows 

 of their many scales are released as the drying- 

 out process pulls the hair-trigger that holds 

 them, and ten thousand thousand winged seeds 

 fly out into the world with the ambition to 

 transform themselves into trees. 



It is interesting to gather a number of dif- 

 ferent species of pine cones before they have 

 begun to open and watch them do so. Some 

 of them jump around like things possessed as 

 the scales on which they rest open up ; others 

 roll this way and turn that. When the last 

 scale is open and the last seed is out, the cone 

 may be three times as large as it was formerly 

 and a hundred or more seeds have been set 

 free. Alas, how few of these ever become 

 trees. We are told, for instance, that a big 

 tree in California produces from ioo to 200 

 seeds to a cone and as many as 1,000,000 cones 

 to the tree — that is, 100,000,000 seeds in a single 

 season. 



There are 42 native species of pines in the 

 United States. They make the woods of Maine 



and other northern States largely evergreen. 

 Countless generations of warring with the ele- 

 ments led them to adopt the needle instead of 

 the leaf, for needles do not oppose the free 

 passage of the wind or afford snow a platform 

 which could crush them. Hence it is that the 

 pines "bind the tottering edge of cleft and 

 chasm and fringe with sudden tints of un- 

 hoped-for spring the Arctic edges of retreat- 

 ing desolation." 



THE GOLDENROD 



(Solidago nemoralis Ait.) 



By legislative action the State flower of Ne- 

 braska, in high favor, though not yet adopted, 

 in Missouri and Alabama, and considered with 

 the violet for the honor in New Jersey, the 

 goldenrod disputes with the violet first place 

 in State preferences (see page 491). 



Not only is the goldenrod a member of one 

 of the most widely known and versatile flower 

 families of the world, but its own household 

 is made up of a large number of brothers and 

 sisters. We are told that there are 85 species 

 of goldenrod in the United States. A few of 

 them have crossed the border into Mexico and 

 some have even invaded South America, thus 

 indicating that there is such a doctrine as 

 "manifest destiny" in flower land as well as in 

 international politics. Over in Europe there 

 are people who like our goldenrod so well that 

 they grow them in their gardens, as we our- 

 selves would surely do were it not for their 

 wonderful ability to shift for themselves. 



All of these species are grouped as members 

 of the genus Solidago, a name which comes to 

 us from ancient Rome, where they thought the 

 goldenrod a possessor of healing powers strong 

 enough to entitle it to be called the "makes 

 whole" plant. The species range from the 

 stout goldenrod, otherwise Solidago squarrosa, 

 which lives up to its name, and the showy 

 goldenrod, which does likewise, to the sweet- 

 scented goldenrod, from which a delightful 

 drink may be brewed, and the slender golden- 

 rod, otherwise Solidago tennifolia. There is 

 one- species which an Irishman must have 

 named, for it is called the white goldenrod. It 

 is just about as logical to speak of a white 

 blackbird, and the botanists get around the in- 

 consistency of its color by calling it Solidago 

 bicolor. 



There is also a species for every locality — 

 the "alpine" for the mountains, the "seaside" 

 for the brackish beach, the "bog" for the deep, 

 soft wood, the "swamp" for the waste places. 



The goldenrod is one of the merchant princes 

 of the plant world. "Quick sales and short 

 profits" is its motto, and it has arranged its 

 wares so that the insects may find whatever 

 they want and in any quantity. The result is 

 that the field covered with goldenrod is an 

 American entomologist's paradise. 



In the days of Queen Elizabeth the golden- 

 rod had a great reputation for healing wounds 

 and was imported in considerable quantities 

 and sold in the London markets in powder 

 form at half a crown a pound. In range the 

 goldenrod covers the continent with its cloth 

 of gold. North, south, east, west, on moun- 



