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The Day-Lily: Achillea
It is time now to restore the common yarrow (Achillea millefolium) to a place in the garden. It has no claim to admiration in respect of beauty, although as a weed it is pretty enough. But it is of great service to clothe with fresh green herbage any hot, dry bank on which grass becomes unsightly in the height of summer. It is, in fact, a good lawn plant, bearing the scythe well, and enduring drought better than any other lawn plant, save, perhaps, the Dutch clover, which keeps a show of green herbage when the grasses are burnt up and as dry as stubble. The common camomile (Anthemis nobilis) has a similar power of endurance, and might be sown with yarrow and clover on dry chalky or gravelly soils where it has been found difficult to establish the true grasses as lawn plants. One other step may be taken to ensure a smooth and fresh greensward in the event of a droughty summer, and that is to set the mowing machine so that it shall not shave so close as to cut into the roots of the lawn plants, for many a good turf has been ruined by frequent close cutting, as though mowing and destroying were to be one and the same thing. The yarrows are bitter plants, more or less aromatic, and for the most part innocuous. Having found a place for Achillea millefolium in the garden, we must now direct attention to the fact that it should have a place in the permanent pasture, as affording to cattle a needful astringent and stomachic. In some parts of Sweden it is employed in the making of beer, being at once a stimulant and an aromatic tonic, and, like the tormentil in certain parts of North Britain, a fair substitute for the hop. The sneezewort (A. ptarmica) has somewhat the flavour of tarragon, and may be used in place of it in a salad. When dried and reduced to powder it is a cheap substitute for snuff; hence its familiar name. Finally, several species of achillea, and possibly all, are in some degree applicable as substitutes for tea. We have in our wanderings tasted many curious kinds of tea, and can speak of two only out of the number as in any way endurable, and even at that undesirable. One was a brewing from a handful of new hay, which a sweet old dame declared delicious to drink, and a certain cure for all possible diseases. The other was a decoction of green sneezewort, which was also declared to be excellent in some way or other. It was endurable to drink, and soon suggested that a judicious use of it might serve one instead of a sea voyage, to promote one of the more famous and supposedly-beneficial consequences of a life on the ocean wave.
