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The heat of the sun causes the effluvia to exhale quickly, so they are seldom offensive. The rest of the country, where not cultivated, is covered with grass, the seed-stalks about knee deep.
A few late asters fringe the roadsides; an occasional bee hums loudly in among them; but there is no sound of laughter, and no shine of raindrops in the broken hoary seed-stalks that strew the way. If the daisy-buds laugh, as surely they do in June, why should not the wind sob and the rain weep as surely they do in October?
The first is, the grass must be allowed to run to seed; and the second is, that the climate must be favorable for encouraging the development of the ergot. "In practice, we find that on land which has been fed on during the summer, unless it has been grazed with unusual care, much of the grass throws up seed-stalks and produces seed.
Unless seed is required, always cut down the seed-stalks as soon as they appear. The best early variety is the Linnaeus. The Victoria is a little later, but much larger, and is the kind that I have usually grown. Radish-seed may be sown one inch deep as soon as the ground is dry enough in spring, and if the vegetable is a favorite, the sowing may be repeated every two weeks.
All the kinds of garden lettuce; but it may be distinguished by its spines on the back of the leaves. It may be remarked, that the milky juice of all lettuce has similar properties to the above; but the juice is not milky till such time as the plant produces seed-stalks, and then the taste in general is too nauseous for it to be eaten. SOLANUM Dulcamara.
To prevent the plants falling over after the seed-stalks are grown, dig deep holes, and plant the entire stump in the ground. Scarecrows should be set up, or some like precaution be taken, to keep away the little seed-birds, that begin to crack the pods as soon as they commence to ripen.
"When it is winter in the northern parts of North America, and the Great Snow Owls have scattered on their southward journey when heavy snows have beaten down and covered the seed-stalks of weeds and well-nigh walled the little fur-bearing beasts into their holes then in regions where March brings only storms of sleet to coat the tree-trunks and lock up insect food, a pair of strange birds are already building their nest.
Another bird is particularly conspicuous at present by its chattering activity, its nest consists of a bundle of fine seed-stalks of grass hung at the end of a branch, the free ends being left untrimmed, and no attempt at concealment made. Many other birds are now active, and so many new notes are heard, that it is probable this is a richer ornithological region than the Zambesi.
I can see yet the glad flutter she could not hide as they came up our front garden walk in an air spiced by the "four-o'clocks," with whose small trumpets red, white, and yellow our children were filling their laps and stringing them on the seed-stalks of the cocoa-grass. He was bent and spectacled, of course; l'entomologie oblige; but, oh, besides! "Comparatively young," Mrs.
Savoury viands of former times come vividly up before the imagination, even in my waking hours; this is rather odd as I am not a dreamer; indeed I scarcely ever dream but when I am going to be ill or actually so. Here all the grasses have run up to seed, and yet they are not more than two feet or so in the seed-stalks. The pasturage is very fine.
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