The mother plant, now dead, toiled busily during the heat of summer and produced thousands of little seeds. The best portion of her substance went to produce these seeds, giving each a portion of rich food for a start in life and wrapping each in a glossy black coat. Now she is ready to sacrifice the rest of her body to be tumbled about, broken in pieces, and scattered in every direction for the good of her precious progeny, most of whom will find new places, where they will stand a chance the next summer to grow into plants. Sometimes the winds are not severe enough or long enough continued, and these old skeletons are rolled into ditches, piled so high in great rows or masses against fences that some are rolled over the rest and pass on beyond. Occasionally some lodge in the tops of low trees, and many are entangled by straggling bushes. In a day or two, or in a week, or a month, the shifting wind may once more start these wrecks in other directions, to be broken up and scatter seeds along their pathway. During the Middle Ages in southern Egypt and Arabia, and eastward, a small plant, with most of the peculiarities of our tumbleweed just described, was often seen, and was thought to be a great wonder. It was called the "rose of Jericho," though it is not a rose at all, but a first cousin to the mustard, and only a small affair at that, scarcely as large as a cabbage head. A number of other plants of this habit are well known on dry plains in various parts of the world; one of the most prominent in the northern United States is called the Russian thistle, which was introduced from Russia with flaxseed. In Dakota, often two, three, or more grow into a community, making when dry and mature a stiff ball two to three feet or more in diameter. [Illustration: FIG. 25.--Mature dry plant of Russian thistle as a tumbleweed. (One-seventh natural size.)] One of our peppergrasses, _Lepidium intermedium_, sometimes attains the size and shape of a bushel basket; when ripe, it is blown about, sowing seeds wherever it goes. The plants of the evening primrose sometimes do likewise, also a spurge, _Euphorbia_ [_Preslii_] _nutans_, a weed a foot to a foot and a half high. Low hop clover, an annual with yellow flowers, which has been naturalized from Europe, has developed recently on strong clay land into a tumbleweed six inches in diameter. The tops of old witch grass, _Panicum capillare_, and hair grass, _Agrostis hyemalis_, become very brittle when ripe, and snap from the parent stem and tumble about singly or in masses, scattering seeds by the millions. I have seen piles of these thin tops larger than a load of hay where they had blown against a grove of trees, and in some cases many were caught in the tops of low trees. [Illustration: FIG. 26.--The top of old witch grass as a tumbleweed. (Reduced two thirds.)]