120 
THE AMERICAN BOTANIST. 
doing, though this is not easy to believe when examining it for 
the first time. The fiber under the name of bass is largely 
used in cigar factories for tying up bundles of cigars. We 
are indebted to Dr. William Trelease of the Missouri Botani- 
cal Garden for the identification of specimens. Dr. Trelease 
writes that he recently saw in the possession of Dr. C. F. 
Millspaugh of the Field Museum some foreign cigars, each 
of which had been wrapped in a sheet of this bast, much as a 
bottle is sometimes wrapped in a thin veneer of cottonwood 
or other protective material. 
Diana's Paint-Brush. — It may be quite possible that 
poetic New Englanders, as Dr. Bailey reports, have given the 
name of Diana's paint-brush to the orange hawk-weed 
(Hieracium aurantiactim) , but in eastern Pennsylvania, 
where this detestable weed has painted square miles of fields 
with red, the farmers have given it a more appropriate name. 
They still call it paint-brush, but the owner of the brush is 
there said to be a certain subphurous individual, whose only 
resemblance to Diana is that his name begins with the same 
initial. 
Plants With Peculiar Names. — The common names 
of plants are most convenient handles at times, but the scientific 
names also have their uses. We might better use the latter 
than some of the common names in use among gardeners. A 
writer in Florida Agriculturist mentions some of these as fol- 
lows : A friend of mine, living in the far West once wrote me 
that a friend had sent her some plants. Among them a 
''Joseph's coat of many colors," an angel's wing, "the for- 
bidden fruit," and 'Vne wandering Jew." She seemed so 
delighted over those plants, that I concluded to increase still 
further her happiness, by sending her ''celestial bride," the 
"star of Bethlehem," and "Solomon's seal." I sent, also, 
"the cross of Jerusalem," "Jacob's ladder," and "Job's tears." 
Enough, surely, to satisfy her ambitions in the way of plants 
