122 DOTTINGS ON THE ROADSIDE. [Chap. VIII.—B. S. 
invarial)ly entertains against foreigners. The German 
contemptuously calls weed “ Unkraut ,” which is the 
antithesis of Kraut (= herb), and means “no herb,” 
or “strange herb,” just as Ding (— thing) is the 
antithesis of Unding (= strange thing, or monster), 
thus clearly expressing that weeds do not belong to 
the herbs of the country, but are something strange, 
unrecognized. Sometimes national prejudices are 
pointedly expressed in the popular names given to 
newly imported weeds. Thus the North American 
Indian names Plantago major , the “Footsteps of the 
White Man;” and the German, the troublesome Peru¬ 
vian Galinsoga parviflora , “ Frenchman’s Weed,” 
though the French are probably quite innocent of its 
having become a pest in the sandy districts of Prussia 
and adjacent States. 
Have the plants we designate “weeds” always 
been weeds ? is a question to be answered. If the 
definition of the term given, and the views taken of 
the nature of these plants be correct, they cannot 
have been weeds in their native country* and the 
deportment of weeds on being translated from one 
part of the world to another would seem to bear out 
this view. There are no complaints against our 
watercress for impeding our rivers and rivulets; 
though assisted by cultivation, it is by no means 
a common or troublesome weed. But look at it in 
New Zealand, where it threatens to choke up al¬ 
together the still rivers, and where its stems often 
attain twelve feet in length, and three-quarters of an 
inch in diameter. Galinsoga parviflora is local enough 
