_Agrostemma Githago_
_Flowers_--Magenta or bright purplish crimson, 1 to 3 in. broad,
solitary at end of long, stout footstem; 5 lobes of calyx leaf-like,
very long and narrow, exceeding petals. Corolla of 5 broad, rounded
petals; 10 stamens; 5 styles alternating with calyx lobes, opposite
petals. _Stem,:_ 1 to 3 ft. high, erect, with few or no branches,
leafy, the plant covered with fine white hairs. _Leaves:_ Opposite,
seated on stem, long, narrow, pointed, erect. _Fruit:_ a 1-celled,
many-seeded capsule.
_Preferred Habitat_--Wheat and other grain fields; dry, waste places.
_Flowering Season_--July-September.
_Distribution_--United States at large; most common in Central and
Western states. Also in Europe and Asia.
“Allons! allons! sow’d cockle, reap’d no corn,” exclaims Byron in
“Love’s Labor’s Lost.” Evidently the farmers even in Shakespeare’s day
counted this brilliant blossom the pest it has become in many of our own
grain fields just as it was in ancient times, when Job, after solemnly
protesting his righteousness, called on his own land to bear record
against him if his words were false. “Let thistles grow instead of
wheat, and _cockle_ instead of barley,” he cried, according to James the
First’s translators; but the “noisome weeds” of the original text seem
to indicate that these good men were more anxious to give the English
people an adequate conception of Job’s willingness to suffer for his
honor’s sake than to translate literally. Possibly the cockle grew in
Southern Asia in Job’s time: to-day its range is north.