WILD FLOWERS [213]
also exhibit polarity. The great lower leaves of the rosin-weed, which stand nearly vertical, with their faces to the east and west, and their edges to the north and south, have directed many a traveler, not from Acadia only, across the prairie until it has earned the titles pilot-weed, compass or polar plant. Various theories have been advanced to account for the curious phenomenon, some claiming that the leaves contained sufficient iron to reader them magnetic - a theory promptly exploded by chemical analysis. Others supposed that the resinous character of the leaves made them susceptible to magnetic influence; but as rosin is a non-conductor of electricity, of course this hypothesis likewise proved untenable. At last Dr. Asa Gray brought forward the only sensible explanation: inasmuch as both surfaces of the rosin-weed leaf are essentially alike, there being very nearly as many stomata on the upper side as on the under, both surfaces are equally sensitive to sunlight; therefore the leaf twists on its petiole until both sides share it as equally as is possible. While the polarity of the prickly lettuce leaves is by no means so marked, Dr. Gray's theory about the rosin-weed may be applied to them as well.
ORANGE or TAWNY HAWKWEED; GOLDEN MOUSE-EAR HAWKWEED; DEVIL'S PAINT-BRUSH (Hieracium aurantiacum) Chicory family
Flower-beads - Reddish orange; 1 in. across or less, the 5-toothed rays overlapping in several series; several heads on short peduncles in a terminal cluster. Stem: Usually leafless, or with 1 to 2 small sessile leaves; 6 to 20 in. high, slender, hairy, from a tuft of hairy, spatulate, or oblong leaves at the base. Preferred Habitat - Fields, woods, roadsides, dry places. Flowering Season - June-September. Distribution - Pennsylvania and Middle States northward into British Possessions.
Peculiar reddish-orange disks, similar in shade to the butterfly weed's umbels, attract our eyes no less than those of the bees, flies, and butterflies for whom such splendor was designed. After cross-fertilization has been effected, chiefly through the agency of the smaller bees, a single row of slender, brownish, persistent bristles attached to the seeds transforms the head into the "devil's paint-brush." Another popular title in England, from whence the plant originally came, is Grimm the Collier. All the plants in this genus take their name from hierax = a hawk, because people in the old country once thought that birds of prey swooped earthward to sharpen their eyesight with leaves of the hawkweed, hawkbit, or speerhawk, as they are variously called. Transplanted into the garden, the orange hawkweed forms a spreading mass of unusual, splendid color.
The RATTLESNAKE-WEED, EARLY or VEIN-LEAF HAWKWEED, SNAKE or POOR ROBIN'S PLANTAIN (H. venosum), with flower-heads only about half an inch across, sends up a smooth, slender stem, paniculately branched above, to display the numerous dandelion-yellow disks as early as May, although October is not too late to find this generous bloomer in pine woodlands, dry thickets, and sandy soil. Purplish-veined oval leaves, more or less hairy, that spread in a tuft next the ground, are probably as efficacious in curing snakebites as those of the rattlesnake plantain (q.v.). When a credulous generation believed that the Creator had indicated with some sign on each plant the special use for which each was intended, many leaves were found to have veinings suggesting the marks on a snake's body; therefore, by simple reasoning, they must extract venom. How delightful is faith cure!
Unlike the preceding, the CANADA HAWKWEED (H. Canadense), lacks a basal tuft at flowering time, but its firm stem, that may be any height from one to five feet, is amply furnished with oblong to lance-shaped leaves seated on it, their midrib prominent, the margins sparingly but sharply toothed. In dry, open woods and thickets, and along shady roadsides, its loosely clustered heads of clear yellow, about one inch across, are displayed from July to September; and later the copious brown bristles remain
ORANGE or TAWNY HAWKWEED; GOLDEN MOUSE-EAR HAWKWEED; DEVIL'S PAINT-BRUSH (Hieracium aurantiacum) Chicory family
Flower-beads - Reddish orange; 1 in. across or less, the 5-toothed rays overlapping in several series; several heads on short peduncles in a terminal cluster. Stem: Usually leafless, or with 1 to 2 small sessile leaves; 6 to 20 in. high, slender, hairy, from a tuft of hairy, spatulate, or oblong leaves at the base. Preferred Habitat - Fields, woods, roadsides, dry places. Flowering Season - June-September. Distribution - Pennsylvania and Middle States northward into British Possessions.
Peculiar reddish-orange disks, similar in shade to the butterfly weed's umbels, attract our eyes no less than those of the bees, flies, and butterflies for whom such splendor was designed. After cross-fertilization has been effected, chiefly through the agency of the smaller bees, a single row of slender, brownish, persistent bristles attached to the seeds transforms the head into the "devil's paint-brush." Another popular title in England, from whence the plant originally came, is Grimm the Collier. All the plants in this genus take their name from hierax = a hawk, because people in the old country once thought that birds of prey swooped earthward to sharpen their eyesight with leaves of the hawkweed, hawkbit, or speerhawk, as they are variously called. Transplanted into the garden, the orange hawkweed forms a spreading mass of unusual, splendid color.
The RATTLESNAKE-WEED, EARLY or VEIN-LEAF HAWKWEED, SNAKE or POOR ROBIN'S PLANTAIN (H. venosum), with flower-heads only about half an inch across, sends up a smooth, slender stem, paniculately branched above, to display the numerous dandelion-yellow disks as early as May, although October is not too late to find this generous bloomer in pine woodlands, dry thickets, and sandy soil. Purplish-veined oval leaves, more or less hairy, that spread in a tuft next the ground, are probably as efficacious in curing snakebites as those of the rattlesnake plantain (q.v.). When a credulous generation believed that the Creator had indicated with some sign on each plant the special use for which each was intended, many leaves were found to have veinings suggesting the marks on a snake's body; therefore, by simple reasoning, they must extract venom. How delightful is faith cure!
Unlike the preceding, the CANADA HAWKWEED (H. Canadense), lacks a basal tuft at flowering time, but its firm stem, that may be any height from one to five feet, is amply furnished with oblong to lance-shaped leaves seated on it, their midrib prominent, the margins sparingly but sharply toothed. In dry, open woods and thickets, and along shady roadsides, its loosely clustered heads of clear yellow, about one inch across, are displayed from July to September; and later the copious brown bristles remain