demolishes when
he finds it hiding from the plow amid the strawberries, or under the
currant-bushes and grapevines, is the dandelion; yet who would banish
it from the meadows or the lawns, where it copies in gold upon the
green expanse the stars of the midnight sky? After its first blooming
comes its second and finer and more spiritual inflorescence, when its
stalk, dropping its more earthly and carnal flower, shoots upward, and
is presently crowned by a globe of the most delicate and aerial
texture. It is like the poet's dream, which succeeds his rank and
golden youth. This globe is a fleet of a hundred fairy balloons, each
one of which bears a seed which it is destined to drop far from the
parent source.

[Illustration: A STALWART WEED]

Most weeds have their uses; they are not wholly malevolent. Emerson
says a weed is a plant whose virtues we have not yet discovered; but
the wild creatures discover their virtues if we do not. The bumblebee
has discovered that the hateful toad-flax, which nothing will eat, and
which in some soils will run out the grass, has honey at its heart.
Narrow-leaved plantain is readily eaten by cattle, and the honey-bee
gathers much pollen from it. The ox-eye daisy makes a fair quality of
hay if cut before it gets ripe. The cows will eat the leaves of the
burdock and the stinging nettles of the woods. But what cannot a cow's
tongue stand? She will crop the poison ivy with impunity, and I think
would eat thistles if she found them growing in the garden. Leeks and
garlics are readily eaten by cattle in the spring, and are said to be
medicinal to them. Weeds that yield neither pasturage for bee nor
herd, yet afford seeds to the fall and winter birds. This is true of
most of the obnoxious weeds of the garden and of thistles. The wild
lettuce yields down for the humming-bird's nest, and the flowers of
whiteweed are used by the kingbird and cedar-bird.

Yet it is pleasant to remember that, in our climate, there are no
weeds so persistent and lasting and universal as grass. Grass is the
natural covering of the fields. There are but four weeds that I know
of--milkweed, live-forever, Canada thistle, and toad-flax--that it
will not run out in a good soil. We crop it and mow it year after
year; and yet, if the season favors, it is sure to come again. Fields
that have never known the plow, and never been seeded by man, are yet
covered with grass. And in human nature, too, weeds are by no means in