![]() Old roots divide at the crown into several heads. The root is perennial and tapering, simple or more or less branched, attaining in a good soil a length of a foot or more and 1/2 inch to an inch in diameter. On picking the flowers, a bitter, milky juice exudes from the broken edges of the stem, which is present throughout the plant, and which when it comes into contact with the hand, turns to a brown stain that is rather difficult to remove. The shining, purplish flower-stalks rise straight from the root, are leafless, smooth and hollow and bear single heads of flowers. across, containing 150 to 200 perfect ray florets on a flat receptacle at the top of a hollow, milky scape 2 to 18 in. Flowers are solitary, golden yellow, 1 to 2 in. The familiar puffball that succeeds the flower is a globular cluster of achenes, each of which is fitted with a parachute-like tuft. The oblong or spatulate, irregularly dentate or pinnatifid leaves grow in a rosette from the milky taproot, which also send up one or more naked flower stems, each terminating in a single yellow flower.
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