THE AMERICAN BOTANIST. 
57 
dear intimate friends, I knew them through and through. 
I did not, and now I know I never will, nor will I know any- 
other flower friend any more than just a little way. 
Look at the grace of the stamens in Tecoma jasminoides ; 
has any other flower hit on anything quite so lovely? And 
with all the countless blossoms overhead, for years past, I 
never have seen it till now. 
I still want to go to the hills, but I intend to study 
botany and the garden will be an ample field for me, for I 
suspect every old friend in it has a secret I can find out, and 
it is sure to be a charming one. 
Orange, Cal. 
OUR POISONOUS PLANTS. 
BY DR. WM. WHITMAN BAILEY. 
OUR native plants, poisonous to the touch, are only two 
in number. These are the common species of Rhus, 
the R. venenata and R. toxicodendron, with its varieties. The 
fruit is variously called "poison dogwood", "poison oak", and 
"poison sumac." The last is the best name for it, being ac- 
cording to facts. It is a sumac. The name dogwood, prop- 
erly belongs to a very different series of plants, namely, to 
the cornels, of which Cornus florida and bunch-berry (Cornns 
Canadensis) are examples of one type. There is another 
series — as in the osier dogwood, {Cornus stolonifera) — that 
lacks the ornamental involucre which makes the first two, so 
beautiful. These cornels are all innocent, but, from con- 
fusion of names, are avoided by many as presumably noxious. 
Rhus venenata grows in swamps or moist places, and is 
a small tree, from eight to twenty feet high. It has a smooth 
gray bark and very large, handsome pinnate leaves, the leaf- 
lets entire, glossy, and acute. In autumn they color gloriously 
and with a great variety of tints, scarlet, crimson, yellow, and 
maroon. Red is the favorite shade, and even when the leaf- 
lets are green, the rachis is red. 
