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A Trip to the Ozarks #9

there grew several interesting plants, one of which is known by the
popular name of the East India Basil (Perilla frutescens). This plant
was a long distance from its home in the Orient, for it is a native of
China, Japan, and the scattered portions of Eastern Asia. Many years
ago this plant was introduced into theis country by both florists and
gardeners to be used as a decorative border for flower beds, which pur-
pose, on account of its large leaves, which are of a deep purple or
violet color, it is well adapted. In the fall of the year it may be
seen in the woods by the wayside from the D.C. southward. A plant that
fruits abundantly, the seeds have either been scattered or washed down
from higher to lower situations, and so in time it has become natural-
ized and well established, and so wherever it is found today, it is
regarded as a wild plant. There is a closely related species of this
Perilla of ours, in fact is may be regarded as the same plant growing
under different conditions, which grows in China near the city of
Nanking, and is hence called Perilla nankinensis. The leaves of this
plant are of such a deep flesh color that it has received the popular
name of " Beek Steak " Plant.

There was in the Ozarks a wide mountain stream, a tributary of the White
River of Arkansas which had received the local, popular, cacoponous name
of "Slicker Creek." The bed of this stream is of solid rock, and this
rock formation extends for some yards from the stream until it becomes
merged in the rocks of the mountain itself. From the copious deposit of
a slipery, or slimy substance upon these rocks, they are exceedingly
treacherous. Many are the falls that have been experienced upon these
rocks by the unwary, by those who have failed to heed the apostolic
admonition: " Let him that thinketh he standeth take heed lest he fall."
All along this stream there grew plants that you will find in the
woods along streams and on the plains and prairies of Texas. There was
one of these plants which, altho it is said to range from Iowa to Neb-
raska and Ark., yet it seemed to be a typical Ozark Mountain plant.
It is called after the collector, Pitcher (Pitctoris Gaura-Gaura
pitcherii. Though an herb, it was shrub-like in appearance, not only on
account of its size but also because the stems or branches were much more
woody than is usually the case with an herb. The branches of this plant
were thickly covered with flowers of a bright pink color.

I tried to find as many species as possible of the graceful Polypodiaceae
or Fern Family. But though I searched every cranny, crevice, and cor-
ber of the Mountains wherever I went; although I wnet doen into ravines
and climbed the Mountain side and neglected not to examine every spot
no matter how arid or dry it might be, or verdant, from the little
stream that trickled down the Mountain side, I found six species only
of the Fern Family. On a high rock over which the water was not only
dripping, but running, there grew several plants of the Maiden Hair
Fern, (H.pedatum). So saturated with water were the moss and decaying
vegetation in which these plants grew, that it was with ease I removed
the plants, root-stock, fronds and all from their hold upon the rock.
This A.pedatum is closely related to the Adiantum (Adiantum) which is
occasionally in this part of the state and which should be called the
Venus Hair Fern, or better, the Southern Maiden Hair Fern, is coarser,
more common and less fern-like, as a comparison of the two will clearly
and plainly show.

At the base of an old rock wall, which had been built many years ago
ostensibly to prevent the soil from washing down the mountain side,
there grew an abundance of the little "ebony spleenwort" (Asplenium
Platyneuron). This fern is not generally cultivated and yet it would
repay cultivation. It is called ebony because the stalks along which

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