v.). For the amateur to name each member of such a horde is
quite hopeless. In branching, raceme-like clusters, from August
to October, this aster displays its numerous flower-heads, less
than an inch across, each with a green cup formed of four or five
series of overlapping bracts, and many white rays, occasionally
violet tipped. The smooth stem, which rises from two to eight
feet above moist soil, is plentifully set with alternate,
pointed-tipped, lance-shaped leaves, tapering to a sessile or
partly clasping base, and sparingly saw-edged. Its range is from
Montana east to Virginia, south to Louisiana, north to Ontario
and New England.
The bushy little WHITE HEATH ASTER (A. ericoides) every one must
know, possibly, as MICHAELMAS DAISY, FAREWELL SUMMER, WHITE
ROSEMARY, or FROSTWEED; for none is commoner in dry soil,
throughout the eastern United States at least. Its smooth, much
branched stem rarely reaches three feet in height, usually it is
not over a foot tall, and its very numerous flower-heads, white
or pink tinged, barely half an inch across, appear in such
profusion from September even to December as to transform it into
a feathery mass of bloom.
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