MANY OR SPECIAL PURPOSES 349 



seed meal. It is also used as a fertilizer. It still 

 contains considerable oil, and is rich in nitrogen, 

 the most expensive element that plants require. 



The oil is refined and filtered for table use and 

 for cooking. Without filtering, it is the staple 

 illuminating oil of Europe, and is quite as com- 

 monly used for lubrication. 



I do not know of a better instance of a weed that 

 has been brought into the service of man than rape, 

 which makes wealth in so many forms, both as 

 raw materials and easily manufactured products. 



fuller's teasel 



In this day, machinery takes the raw wool and 

 cards, spins, weaves, and dyes it, with scarcely a 

 hand touching the warp or woof until the finished 

 cloth is rolled onto a bolt for the merchant to 

 unroll on his counter. One process in the making 

 of cloth depends upon the seed heads of a weedy 

 plant. No inventor has been able to imitate in 

 steel the fuller's teasel. It comes down into the 

 modern woolen mills from the days when it helped 

 the hand worker co bring up the "nap" on cloth. 

 All the primitive machinery has passed into mus- 

 eums — all but the hooks on the teasels. They 

 Were as flexible, as strong, as efficient in the begin- 



