THE AMERICAN BOTANIST 



85 



Take some extreme instances. There is, for example, 

 Solidago bi-color with white rays and yehow disk-flowers, or 

 ^. lanceolata and 5^. TcnuifoUa, bushy in habit and with broad, 

 spreading, clusters of minute heads, disposed in compound 

 corymbs. I have many times tested people on these and found 

 they had no suspicion as to what they were. Then for size of 

 heads, compare the very large splendid ones of the maritime 

 species so common on the sea-coast or along our bay shores. 

 It is the Solidago scuipcn'irciis, very stout, with smooth, en- 

 tire, narrow, leaves. One never finds it far from the shore. 

 Another species with extraordinarily large heads is Solidago 

 rigida, its broad leaves as harsh as a file to the touch. In 

 Rhode Island this is one of our very rarest kinds. 



In height the species vary from the grand speciosa, five 

 or six feet high, to the pretty dwarf virgaiirea, only a few 

 inches in height, growing as an alpine or sub-alpine on all our 

 loftier mountains. The leaves, as we have seen, vary exten- 

 sively in texture. So do they, as everyone must see, in form, 

 from the broad ones of latifolia, to the linear foliage of tenui- 

 folia so abundant on Block Island. 



Again, the inflorescence or disposition of the flowers var- 

 ies from spicate to racemose, panicled and broadly corymbose. 

 As to soil again, the location depends wholly on the kind. 

 Some like the queerly named neinoralis, very persistent on 

 Warwick plains, grow only in the open and sandy districts, 

 others love to hug stone walls and clift's. We have seen that 

 one grows only by the sea-shore; others, like odora, thrive 

 in open woods; a few climb well up on mountains and one, 

 as we have noticed, crowns the highest peaks. 



\\t hope that in these few lines we have disposed of the 

 idea of the goldenrod. There are many and diverse kinds, 

 as there are also of their cousins, the asters. It is their puz- 

 zling number and variety that makes them a favorite study of 

 industrious students. 



