cross-fertilization. Their colors, their odors, or the abundant nectar
secreted by them attract numerous insects, and, while these little
animals are providing for themselves Nature has also provided for the
best interests of the plant, as the pollen scattered upon their bodies
during their visit to a flower, is carried to another flower of like
kind, thus causing a cross between the two plants, which results in a
better grade of seeds.
The botanical name of the genista in the illustration is _Cytisus
canariensis_, a native of the Canary Islands. The origin of the generic
name, _Cytisus_, is obscure, though it is generally considered to be
the ancient Greek name of the plant, and has its origin in the fact
that the first species was discovered on the island of Cythrus, one of
the Cyclades, a group of islands south of Greece. The specific name is
derived from the name of the island where the plant is native.
The pure yellow flowers are grouped along the branches in terminal
clusters. They are sweet-scented, showy and frequently so numerous as
to make the plant appear like a mass of yellow blooms.
The leaves are very small, consisting of three leaflets similar in
form to those of the common clove. The surface of the leaves, and of
the young twigs, is covered by fine and soft hairs, causing a hoary
appearance.
The plant is a shrub varying in height from a few inches to that of a
man. It bears numerous and crowded branches.
Some of the other species of this interesting genus of plants bear
purple or white flowers, and some obtain the stature of trees.
[Illustration: GENISTA.
COPYRIGHT 1900, BY
A. W. MUMFORD, CHICAGO.]
WHERE VEGETABLES CAME FROM.
The customer at a Lewiston market was in a reflective mood Saturday
morning and would talk.
"How many of your customers know anything about what they eat?" said he.
"They ought to," said the blue frock, "they buy it and they order it."
"I don't mean that," was the reply. "Of course they know what they eat,
but who of them know anything about the stuff? Take vegetables, for
instance."
"Oh, lots of 'em know," said the market man. "Here's potatoes, for
instance. They are native Americans. I guess Sir Walter Raleigh
introduced them to Europe."
"I guess he never ate one, for in his time they were not considered
fit to eat. They went to Europe from the hills of South America and
a strange matter of fact, when you come to think of it, is that in
the United States, where, barring a few sections, vegetables grow in
greater abundance and beauty than any other part of the world, none
save maize and the ground artichokes are native products."
"Nonsense!" ejaculated the amazed market man.
"No nonsense about it," continued the contemplative customer. "Europe,
Asia, Africa and South America are all more richly endowed than we.
I used to think the watermelon was ours, but, bless you! the north
African tribes grew the big, juicy fellows and gave us our first seeds.
As to the musk-melon, it is a vegetable of such lineage that, like
the cabbage and lettuce, nobody knows just who were their first wild
progenitors. The melon, at any rate, came out of Persia as a developed
table delicacy, while the Adam of the cabbage family is agreed by
botanists to have flourished way back there in Central Asia, where they
say the Caucasian race came from. The Romans ate cabbage salad, and,
according to count, there are nearly as many varieties of this sturdy
old green goods as there are different races of men.
"There is another Roman delicacy," continued the customer, pointing
to a box of beets. "They do say that the Greek philosophers thought
a dish of boiled beets, served up with salt and oil, a great aid to
mental exercise. For my part, though, I don't know a vegetable that
should be prouder of its family history than the radish. Radishes
came from China, but a scientific journal the other day announced the
discovery from a translation of Egyptian hieroglyphics that Pharaoh
fed his pyramid builders on radishes. He even went so far as to spend
1,900 silver talents in order to regale his masons with the crisp and
spicy root. Again, if you read the Old Testament carefully, you will
be sure to come across the announcement that in Egypt the children
of Israel ate melons, beets, onions and garlic, and, evidently, in
traveling through the wilderness, Moses had a great deal of difficulty
in persuading them to cease yearning after these Egyptian dainties.
"Besides the melons and peaches and geraniums," continued the garrulous
customer, "for all of which we have to thank productive Persia, water
cress comes from her valleys and brooks and she taught the world how
to grow and head lettuce. However, the Roman gourmands, who adopted
both these salads, ate green peas and string beans that their gardeners
found growing in France and South Germany, and cucumbers were as
popular with them as with the Jews and Egyptians.
"To Arabia honor is due for the burr artichoke. They ate it for
liver difficulties--and, as a matter of fact, there is no vegetable
so good for men and women who lead a sedentary life, just as carrots,
that grew first in Belgium, are an admirable tonic for the complexion,
spinach for the blood, potatoes for the hair, and celery for the
nerves. Rhubarb, they say, was never known until the fifteenth century,
when the Russians found it on the banks of the Volga, and, if you will
believe it, the only European people who appreciate the eggplant as we
do are the Turks. North Africa first produced this vegetable; in France
it is eaten raw often as not and in obstinate England they use it for
decoration. However, the potato had to make a desperate struggle for
popularity and for nearly a century, after it was imported and grown
in Europe nobody could be persuaded to touch it. Finally Parmentier
gave it a boom that in two centuries has not in the least diminished,
and twice this little tuber has saved Europe from what promised to
be a cruel famine." Whereupon the customer hurried off down the
street, leaving the green-grocer staring at his stock of truck with a
refreshing expression of pride and interest.
BIRDS AND FARMERS.
If it were customary, says a contemporary, to list such matters after
the manner of stock reports, the pages of the daily papers in these
days, suggestive of approaching spring, would contain two quotations
something like these: "Millinery active," "Audubons aggressive."
During the cold winter months just passed, while its bird friends
were in the South, the Illinois Audubon Society has been working
to the end that the women who will flock to the "spring millinery
openings" already heralded shall with resolute faces pass by the
dainty feather-decked creations, and purchase only those which are
flower-crowned or ribbon-decked. The directors of the bird protective
society have issued within a day or two a pamphlet compiled by William
Dutcher, treasurer of the American Ornithologists' Union. It will be
sent to all the farmers' institutes, and to individual husbandmen by
the hundreds, for the society believes, after having tried many means
of teaching the bird-preservation lesson, that the best way to get
at the milliners and the women is through the agriculturists. The
more enthusiastic Audubonites declare that when the farmers read Mr.
Dutcher's leaflet they will rise in mass and demand that bird killing
for millinery or any other purpose be stopped. The husbandmen have
a yearly crop interest of nearly three billion dollars. The total
capital invested in the millinery trade is only twenty-five millions.
Mr. Dutcher says that agriculture loses two hundred million every year
because of the attacks of injurious insects. As the birds diminish in
number, the loss increases, a fact which he declares is proved beyond
a peradventure. A difference of only one per cent in the value of the
farm products means a loss equal to the value of the millinery trade of
the country. As a matter of fact, the farmer is the man who is paying
the greater part of the millinery bills of the land.
The Audubon Society, after three years of active work, has come to the
conclusion that appeals to the sympathies, and the humane feelings of
men and women, are not so potent as are plain statements of facts which
show how the pocketbook is touched.
FISH HAVE FAVORITE HAUNTS.
One strange feature of this sea life of the tropics is the regular
recurrence of migratory swarms of fish of very small size that return
in huge numbers year after year with such absolute regularity that
the natives calculate on the event on a certain date in each year and
even within an hour or two of the day, says a writer in _Lippincott's
Magazine_. One such swarm of fish forms the occasion of an annual
holiday and feast at Samoa. The fish is not unlike the whitebait for
which the English Thames has so long been celebrated and each year
it arrives in Samoa on the same day in the month of October, remains
for a day, or at the most two days and then disappears entirely until
the same day the following year. Why it comes, or whence, no curious
naturalist has yet discovered, nor has anybody traced its onward course
when it leaves the Samoan group, but the fact is unquestionable that
suddenly, without notice, the still waters of the lagoon which surround
each island within the fringing reef become alive with millions of
fishes, passing through them for a single day and night and then
disappearing for a year as though they had never come.
A visit to Samoa enabled me to see this strange phenomenon for myself
and to witness the native feast by which it is celebrated year by year.
I had been in Samoa for a month and in that month I had enjoyed almost
a surfeit of beauty. I had coasted the shores of its islands, I had
bathed in the warm, still waters of its lagoons, fringed to seaward
by the white reef, on which the ocean broke in golden spray, and to
landward by the silver beach of coral sand, flecked with the tremulous
shadows of the swaying palms. I had climbed with my native guide the
abrupt hills, covered with dense forests of tropical luxuriance,
through the arcades of which I caught glimpses of the flash and luster
of the ocean's myriad smiles, and again we had plunged into deep
valleys among the hills, where little headlong streams murmur under the
shade of the widespreading bread-fruit trees and wave the broad leaves
of the great water lilies of the Pacific coast islands. This visit of
the fishes came as a climax of wonders.
SILLIEST BIRD IN THE WORLD.
Dodo is the Portuguese name for simpleton, and it is given to the
silliest bird that ever lived.
Three hundred years ago, when the Portuguese first visited the Island
of Mauritius, they found a great number of these birds. They were about
the size of a large swan, blackish gray in color and having only a
bunch of feathers in place of a tail, and little, useless wings. More
stupid and foolish birds could not be imagined. They ran about making
a silly, hissing noise like a goose, and the sailors easily knocked
them over with their paddles. They couldn't fly, they couldn't swim,
they couldn't run at any great speed, and as for fighting, they were
the greatest cowards in the world. They were much too stupid to build a
nest, and so they dropped an egg in the grass and went off and let it
hatch as best it could. Added to all these things its flesh was fairly
good to eat, and the Portuguese pursued it so steadily for food that
in less than a century's time there wasn't a single dodo left in the
world. It was quite too silly and stupid to save its own life, and so
it became extinct.
THYME.
(_Thymus Serpyllum L._)
DR. ALBERT SCHNEIDER, Northwestern University School of Pharmacy.
But, if a pinching winter thou foresee,
And wouldst preserve thy famished family,
With fragrant thyme the city fumigate.
--_Virgil, Georgics, (Dryden), IV., 350._
The field or wild thyme (_Thymus serpyllum_) is a small, much-branched
shrub, about one foot high, with rather slender quadrangular, purplish,
pubescent stems. Leaves small, opposite, sessile. Flowers numerous, in
clusters in the axils of the upper leaves. Corolla purplish, irregular;
calyx green and persistent. The plant is propagated by means of
underground stems. It is far from being a showy plant.
This plant is closely related to the garden thyme (_T. vulgaris, L._),
and grows profusely in meadows, fields and gardens. Both species are
very fragrant and it is to this characteristic that they owe their
popularity. The ancient Greeks and Romans valued thyme very highly and
made use of it as a cosmetic, in medicine and in veterinary practice,
much as it is used at the present time. Thyme yields the oil of thyme
which is a valuable antiseptic, used as a gargle and mouth wash, for
toothache, in dressing wounds and ulcers, also for sprains and bruises,
in chronic rheumatism, etc. It finds extensive use in the preparation
of perfumes and scented soaps; but its principal use is in veterinary
practice. The herb is much used as a flavoring agent in soups and
sauces, in fomentations, in baths and in the preparation of scented
pillows.
Two kinds of oil of thyme appear upon the market, the red oil and
the white oil. The latter is less aromatic being the product of
redistillation. The oil is also known as oil of origanum.
Although thyme is an insignificant plant as far as appearances are
concerned it has been sung by many poets. In Shakespeare's "Midsummer
Night's Dream" Oberon, the king of the fairies, says to Robin
Goodfellow;
"I know a bank where the wild thyme blows,
Where oxlips and the nodding violet grows,
Quite over-canopied with luscious woodbine,
With sweet musk-roses and with eglantine."
Another reference to thyme is to be found in the beautiful and pathetic
story of "The Adopted Child" by Mrs. Hemans. The orphan boy in speaking
to the kind lady who has adopted him, says:
"Oh! green is the turf where my brothers play
Through the long, bright hours of the summer day;
They find the red cup-moss where they climb,
And they chase the bee o'er the scented thyme."
[Illustration: THYME.
FROM KOEHLER'S MEDICINAL-PFLANZEN.
CHICAGO:
A. W. MUMFORD, PUBLISHER.]
DESCRIPTION OF PLATE.--_A_, plant somewhat reduced; 1, 2, leaves;
3, flower bud; 4, 5, flower; 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, different views of the
flower; 9, flower without stamens; 10, stamens; 11, pollen grains;
12, 13, pistil; 14, developing fruit; 15, transverse section of
fruit; 16, ripening fruit; 17, 18, 19, seed.
A CURIOUS SURVIVAL.
ELLA F. MOSBY.
The tongue of a bird, says Mrs. Olive Thorne Miller, is the tool that
shows how he gets his living, as the anvil and hammer tell of the
blacksmith's work, the hod of the bricklayer's, and the chisel and
plane of the carpenter's. The tongue of the woodpecker is a barbed
spear, very adhesive or sticky on its surface. We know at a glance that
he uses it to capture insects hiding in the crevices of the bark, and
if they are too small to be speared by its sharp point, they will stick
to its gluey surface. "The four-tined fork" of the little nuthatch
is admirable for catching grubs out of the rough tree-trunk, and the
slender tube of the humming-bird's tongue proves him a dainty taster
of flower-sweets, though he, too, catches insects, with a _click_ of
his long, sharp bill as he flies, when flowers are rare. But there is
a small bird whose tongue does not tell his own story. His tropical
ancestry of many and many a year ago, like the humming-bird, sucked
honey from flower-cups and juices from fruits, and so by a very
curious survival of structure, this Cape May warbler that feeds on
insects now has the tongue cleft at the tip and provided with a fringe
like the iridescent and shining sunbird's, the honey-creeper's and
flower-pecker's of southern isles. Their tongues, "pencils of delicate
filaments," brush the drops of honeyed nectar from the deep tubes of
tropic flowers and their sharp, needle-like bills probe the juicy
fruits, though, like humming-birds, they adds small insects to their
bill of fare when necessary.
This peculiarity on the part of the Cape May is the more curious
because _all_ the warblers, numerous as these are and varying as
widely as possible in character, plumage and habits, are alike in one
respect--they are insect-eaters. Whether they are ground warblers or
haunt river side and stream or explore trunk, branch, and twig-like
creepers, or glean their food from the leaves, or resemble the
flycatchers in habit, they live on insects, flies, ants, canker-worms,
caterpillars, gnats, the larvæ and eggs of insects; nothing of
this sort comes amiss to them. Some warblers seek this food in the
tree-tops, and rarely descend; others feed on the ground and build
their nests there. Many frequent lower boughs and shrubs, but all seek
insects as their prey. A few, it is true, like the eccentric chat and
the pretty gold-crowned thrush, who is _not_ a thrush after all, in
spite of his speckled breast, are very fond of berries. But none retain
the honey-sucking habits for which the tube-like and fringed tongues,
and keen, needle-like bills, were fashioned.
There is also a queer coincidence between the nest-making of the
Cape May warbler and that of the flower-peckers in the Philippines
Islands--another curious survival. Mr. John Whitehead, the naturalist
and explorer, found a most exquisite rose-colored pouch, which looked
as if formed of rose-petals, though it was in fact made of other
material. The little honey-sucker had woven it together with the silken
threads of a spider's web. Now, the Cape May warbler weaves his partly
hanging nest of twigs and grass, and lines it with horsehair in the
great fir woods of the north, but he, too, fastens it together _with
spider's webbing_.
The Cape May is a rare warbler. Dr. Rives, in his list of Virginia
birds, mentions it as "a rare migrant," though Dr. Fisher says it is
sometimes comparatively common in the fall near Washington. It was,
therefore, a charming surprise when (September, 1899,) I found the
Cape Mays our most common migrants at Lynchburg, Va. From September
20 to October 18 our maple-tree was rarely without them. A great deal
of noisy work was going on close by, as the street was being widened
and newly paved, but these "tiny scraps of valor," as Emerson calls
his friends, the chickadees, showed no timidity or distrust. The
colors of the different birds varied widely. One could hardly believe
that the adult male Cape May with his striking white on rich olive
above, and his tiger-like streaks of glossy black on shining yellow
below, his dark cap and chestnut-red ear-patches, belonged to the same
family as the immature female. _She_ is plain grayish olive above,
and has a streaked grayish breast, as sober as a Quaker, save for her
yellow rump. The Cape May, the prairie, the myrtle and the magnolia
warblers are the four yellow-rumped species--a most convenient mark of
distinction.
In character our little visitor showed energy and courage, usually
driving off any new-comer, even of his own family, from his
feeding-ground. He journeys in mixed crowds, but prefers a table to
himself. He even won respect from English sparrows by his pugnacious
traits. They generally let him alone, though they attacked the other
strangers unmercifully. He explored his tree thoroughly, and with great
agility, often spending hours in traveling from bough to bough, twig
to twig, up and down our maple, and especially examining the underside
of all the leaves within reach. Sometimes on tiptoe he stretched his
pretty head to its farthest extent to investigate a dangling leaf above
him; sometimes he hung, head downward, to clean the eggs and larvæ from
a leaf below. I have seen him dextrously somersault to a lower bough,
or hold on to a slender twig, scolding and pecking alternately, as the
wind-tossed him to and fro. Occasionally he sang a little song, rather
thin and monotonous, but not unpleasing. It has been compared to the
song of the Nashville warbler, and also to that of the black and white
creeper.
The cause of his long stay was no doubt the abundance of insects during
our warm fall. Swarms of gauzy-winged insects were seen everywhere,
wheeling in airy circles in the sun, and sometimes covering the wraps
and hats of pedestrians. There were crowds of birds in our parks. One
sunny afternoon I watched with interest the likeness between a wood
pewee, catching insects in the air, and a flock of Cape May warblers
engaged in the same pursuit. But there was a difference; the warbler
darted straight out from his magnolia tree, caught his gnat and
returned, whether to the same bough I could not see for the leaves were
so thick, but probably only near by. The true flycatcher fluttered in
an aerial circle, returning to precisely the same perch after capturing
his insect.
The tiny fringed and cleft tongues seemed useless in this occupation,
but like some parts of the human body for which we have not yet
ascertained the present use, they may be invaluable as records of past
history under different conditions from those of to-day.
* * * * *
"Look at Nature. She never wearies of saying over her floral pater
noster. In the crevices of Cyclopean walls--on the mounds that
bury huge cities--in the dust where men lie, dust also--still that
sweet prayer and benediction. The 'Amen!' of Nature is always a
flower."--_Autocrat._
The gorse is yellow on the heath,
The banks with speedwell flowers are gay,
The oaks are budding; and beneath
The hawthorn soon will bear the wreath,
The silver wreath of May.
--_Charlotte Smith._
[Illustration: RAVEN.
1/3 Life-size.
FROM COL. F. KAEMPFER.
COPYRIGHT 1900, BY
A. W. MUMFORD, CHICAGO.]
THE RAVEN.
(_Corvus Corax._)
This handsome and truly interesting bird is found in nearly all
portions of the globe wherever there are wide expanses of uncultivated
ground. It is a solitary bird, living in the wildest places it can
find, especially preferring those that are intersected with hills. In
such localities it is said the raven reigns supreme, "scarcely the
eagle himself daring to contest the supremacy with so powerful, crafty,
and strong-beaked a bird."
The raven lives almost entirely on food of an animal nature, and there
are few living things which it will not eat when the opportunity is
given it. Worms, grubs, caterpillars, and insects of all kinds are
swallowed by hundreds, though carrion is its chief diet. Its wings are
large and powerful, and its daily range of flight is so extensive that
many hundreds of objects pass under its ken, and it is tolerably sure,
in the course of the day, to find at least one dead sheep or lamb. So
strongly is the desire for attacking wounded or dying animals implanted
in the breast of the raven, that, according to Mudie, the best method
of attracting one of these birds within gunshot is to lie on the back
on some exposed part of a hill with the gun concealed and close at
hand. It is needful to remain perfectly quiet, because if there is
the slightest sign of life the raven will not approach, for, as Mudie
rather quaintly observes, "he is shy of man and of all large animals
in nature; because, though glad to find others carrion, or to make
carrion of them if he can do it with impunity, he takes good care that
none shall make carrion of him." It is needful to watch carefully, and
not to be overcome by sleep, as the first intimation of the raven's
approach would to a certainty be the loss of an eye.
The tongue of the raven is rather curiously formed, being broad, flat,
covered with a horny kind of shield, and deeply cleft at the extremity.
At the root are four rather large projections or spines, the points
being directed backward. The use of the spines is not known.
The cunning of the raven is proverbial, and many anecdotes are told of
its intellectual powers. Charles Dickens in "Barnaby Rudge" has made of
it an interesting character, which is by no means overdrawn. From the
mass of these stories we will select one which is not generally known: