Itlaruta cotula. Natural Order: Composite—Aster Family. 
;ERHAPS the commonest of all uncultivated plants is this 
roadside outcast, growing from the deep-rutted soil, utterly 
J/ disregarding all the ordinary conditions required for herbal 
1 perfection, it sports its numerous blossoms, and during the 
whole summer its flowers make white the borders of the 
way. It is an annual, though so abundant as to seem 
^perennial, and only the greatest perseverance can eradicate it or 
educe it to subjection. Of European origin, it was probably introduced 
vith grain. The flower is really pretty, combining the purest of yel- 
ow, with the most opaque white, in an admirable and artistic manner, 
nd could it only have been odorless and rare, would have been 
received with ecstatic admiration, instead of contumely and contempt. 
The origin ot the botanic name Maruta is obscure, and its meaning is 
quite uncertain. Cotula was the half-pint measure of the Greeks and 
Romans. 
D UMOR doth double like the voice and echo, 
The numbers of the fear’d. —Shakespeare. 
THE %ing rumors gather’d as they roll’d; 
Scarce any tale was sooner heard than told, 
And all who told it added something new, 
And all who heard it made enlargement .too; 
In every ear it spread, on every tongue it grew. 
■— Pope. 
FROM the Orient to the drooping West, 
Making the wind my post-horse, still unfold 
The acts commenced on this ball of earth: 
Upon my tongues continual slanders ride, 
The which in every language I pronounce, 
Stuffing the ears of men with false reports. 
— Shakespeare. 
\ WHISPER woke the air — 
A soft, light tone, and low, 
Yet barb’d with shame and woe,— 
Now, might it only perish there! 
No farther go! -Mrs. Osgood. 
JYUMOR is a pipe 
Blown by surmises, jealousies, conjectures, 
And of so easy and so plain a stop, 
That the blunt monster with uncounted heads — 
The still discordant, wavering muititude — 
Can play upon it. 
— Shakespeare. 
