tkrbascum tl)CipSUS. Natural Order: Scrophulariacece — 
rigwon family. 
v\b 
c® 
A- n^»,.. ,TT 5^. ^ERBASCUM, or Mullein, is a common wayside plant, that 
we will dignify with a place in this volume as a slight 
Jy° recompense for the abuse it has ever, and will ever, receive, 
(p Condemned as a weed, considered as evidence of an untidy 
landholder wherever it is seen occupying the fields, its stately 
stalk a target for every roadside rambler’s stick, it has at least 
: some virtues, and less vice than it generally obtains credit for, and 
shall receive a tribute for the memory of childhood, when we remem¬ 
ber seeing its golden blossoms so far above our head. The whole 
plant presents a gray appearance, from the dense woolly texture that 
.covers its leaves and stalk. It is said to have been used in ancient 
Times as wicks for lamps, or was placed in small vessels of oil, and one 
end lighted, the oil continually creeping up its dense surface, supplying the flame 
with fuel; and many a country lassie has been indebted for her rosy cheeks to a 
pilfered leaf, whose rough surface she has furtively applied to her smooth skin. 
The plant has several medicinal properties, being demulcent, anti-spasmodic, and 
useful as an anodyne. The German name is xuollkraut, signifying wool-plant. 
cob 1] ;ii n rc* 
pOOD humor only teaches charms to last, 
Still makes new conquests, and maintains the past. 
TTE keeps his temper’d mind serene and pure, 
-*■ And ev’ry passion aptly harmonized, 
Amid a jarring world. —Thompson. 
— Pope. 
SWEETER and a lovelier gentleman, 
Framed in the prodigality of nature, 
The spacious world cannot again afford. 
— Shakespeare. 
'THOUGH time her bloom is stealing, 
There’s still beyond his art — 
The wild-flower wreath of feeling, 
The sunbeam of the heart. —Halleck. 
214 
