Wild Flowers Worth Knowing Part 2

_Erythronium americanum_

_Flower_--Solitary, pale russet yellow, rarely tinged with purple, slightly fragrant, 1 to 2 in. long, nodding from the summit of a root-stalk 6 to 12 in, high, or about as tall as the leaves. Perianth bell-shaped, of 6 petal-like, distinct segments, spreading at tips, dark spotted within; 6 stamens; the club-shaped style with 3 short, stigmatic ridges. _Leaves:_ 2, unequal, grayish green, mottled and streaked with brown or all green, oblong, 3 to 8 in. long, narrowing into clasping petioles.

_Preferred Habitat_--Moist open woods and thickets, brooksides.

_Flowering Season_--March-May.

_Distribution_--Nova Scotia to Florida, westward to the Mississippi.

Colonies of these dainty little lilies, that so often grow beside leaping brooks where and when the trout hide, justify at least one of their names; but they have nothing in common with the violet or a dog's tooth. Their faint fragrance rather suggests a tulip; and as for the bulb, which in some of the lily-kin has toothlike scales, it is in this case a smooth, egg-shaped corm, producing little round offsets from its base. Much fault is also found with another name on the plea that the curiously mottled and delicately pencilled leaves bring to mind, not a snake's tongue, but its skin, as they surely do. Whoever sees the sharp purplish point of a young plant darting above ground in earliest spring, however, at once sees the fitting application of adder's tongue. But how few recognize their plant friends at all seasons of the year!

Every one must have noticed the abundance of low-growing spring flowers in deciduous woodlands, where, later in the year, after the leaves overhead cast a heavy shade, so few blossoms are to be found, because their light is seriously diminished. The thrifty adder's tongue, by laying up nourishment in its storeroom underground through the winter, is ready to send its leaves and flower upward to take advantage of the sunlight the still naked trees do not intercept, just as soon as the ground thaws.

Yellow Clintonia

_Clintonia borealis_

_Flowers--_Straw color or greenish yellow, less than 1 in. long, 3 to 6 _nodding_ on slender pedicels from the summit of a leafless scape 6 to 15 in. tall. Perianth of 6 spreading divisions, the 6 stamens attached; style, 3-lobed. _Leaves:_ Dark, glossy, large, oval to oblong, 2 to 5 (usually 3), sheathing at the base. _Fruit:_ Oval blue berries on _upright_ pedicels.

_Preferred Habitat_--Moist, rich, cool woods and thickets.

_Flowering Season_--May-June.

_Distribution-_--From the Carolinas and Wisconsin far northward.

To name ca.n.a.ls, bridges, city thoroughfares, booming factory towns after De Witt Clinton seems to many appropriate enough; but why a shy little woodland flower? As fitly might a wee white violet carry down the name of Theodore Roosevelt to posterity! "Gray should not have named the flower from the Governor of New York," complains Th.o.r.eau. "What is he to the lovers of flowers in Ma.s.sachusetts? If named after a man, it must be a man of flowers." So completely has Clinton, the practical man of affairs, obliterated Clinton, the naturalist, from the popular mind, that, were it not for this plant keeping his memory green, we should be in danger of forgetting the weary, overworked governor, fleeing from care to the woods and fields; pursuing in the open air the study which above all others delighted and refreshed him; revealing in every leisure moment a too-often forgotten side of his many-sided greatness.

Wild Spikenard; False Solomon's Seal; Solomon's Zig-zag

_Smilacina racemosa_

_Flowers_--White or greenish, small, slightly fragrant, in a densely flowered terminal raceme. Perianth of 6 separate, spreading segments; 6 stamens; 1 pistil. _Stem:_ Simple, somewhat angled, 1 to 3 ft. high, scaly below, leafy, and sometimes finely hairy above. _Leaves:_ Alternate and seated along stem, oblong, lance-shaped, 3 to 6 in. long, finely hairy beneath. _Rootstock:_ Thick, fleshy. _Fruit:_ A cl.u.s.ter of aromatic, round, pale red speckled berries.

_Preferred Habitat_--Moist woods, thickets, hillsides.

_Flowering Season_--May-July.

_Distribution_--Nova Scotia to Georgia; westward to Arizona and British Columbia.

As if to offer opportunities for comparison to the confused novice, the true Solomon's Seal and the so-called false species--quite as honest a plant--usually grow near each other. Grace of line, rather than beauty of blossom, gives them both their chief charm. But the feathery plume of greenish-white blossoms that crowns the false Solomon's Seal's somewhat zig-zagged stem is very different from the small, greenish, bell-shaped flowers, usually nodding in pairs along the stem, under the leaves, from the axils of the true Solomon's Seal. Later in summer, when hungry birds wander through the woods with increased families, the Wild Spikenard offers them branching cl.u.s.ters of pale red speckled berries, whereas the former plant feasts them with blue-black fruit.

Hairy, or True, or Twin-flowered Solomon's Seal

_Polygonatum biflorum_

_Flowers_--Whitish or yellowish green, tubular, bell-shaped, 1 to 4, but usually 2, drooping on slender peduncles from leaf axils. Perianth 6-lobed at entrance, but not spreading; 6 stamens, the filaments roughened; 1 pistil. _Stem:_ Simple, slender, arching, leafy, 8 in. to 3 ft. long. _Leaves:_ Oval, pointed, or lance-shaped, alternate, 2 to 4 in. long, seated on stem, pale beneath and softly hairy along veins.

_Rootstock:_ Thick, horizontal, jointed, scarred. (_Polygonatum_ = many joints.) _Fruit:_ A blue-black berry.

_Preferred Habitat_--Woods, thickets, shady banks.

_Flowering Season_--April-June.

_Distribution_--New Brunswick to Florida, westward to Michigan.

From a many-jointed, thick rootstock a single graceful curved stem arises each spring, withers after fruiting, and leaves a round scar, whose outlines suggested to the fanciful man who named the genus the seal of Israel's wise king. Thus one may know the age of a root by its seals, as one tells that of a tree by the rings in its trunk.

Early or Dwarf Wake-Robin

_Trillium nivale_

_Flowers_--Solitary, pure white, about 1 in. long, on an erect or curved peduncle, from a whorl of 3 leaves at summit of stem. Three spreading, green, narrowly oblong sepals; 3 oval or oblong petals; 6 stamens, the anthers about as long as filaments; 3 slender styles stigmatic along inner side. _Stem_: 2 to 6 in. high, from a short, tuber-like rootstock.

_Leaves_: 3 in a whorl below the flower, 1 to 2 in. long, broadly oval, rounded at end, on short petioles. _Fruit_: A 3-lobed reddish berry, about 1/2 in. diameter, the sepals adhering.

_Preferred Habitat_--Rich, moist woods and thickets.

_Flowering Season_--March-May.

_Distribution_--Pennsylvania, westward to Minnesota and Iowa, south to Kentucky.

Only this delicate little flower, as white as the snow it sometimes must push through to reach the suns.h.i.+ne melting the last drifts in the leafless woods, can be said to wake the robins into song; a full chorus of feathered love-makers greets the appearance of the more widely distributed, and therefore better known, species.

By the rule of three all the trilliums, as their name implies, regulate their affairs. Three sepals, three petals, twice three stamens, three styles, a three-celled ovary, the flower growing out from a whorl of three leaves, make the naming of wake-robins a simple matter to the novice.

One of the most chastely beautiful of our native wild flowers--so lovely that many shady nooks in English rock-gardens and ferneries contain imported clumps of the vigorous plant--is the Large-flowered Wake-Robin, or White Wood Lily (_T. grandiflorum_). Under favorable conditions the waxy, thin, white, or occasionally pink, strongly veined petals may exceed two inches; and in Michigan a monstrous form has been found. The broadly rhombic leaves, tapering to a point, and lacking petioles, are seated in the usual whorl of three, at the summit of the stem, which may attain a foot and a half in height; from the centre the decorative flower arises on a long peduncle.

Certainly the commonest trillium in the East, although it thrives as far westward as Ontario and Missouri, and south to Georgia, is the Nodding Wake-Robin (_T. cernuum_), whose white or pinkish flower droops from its peduncle until it is all but hidden under the whorl of broadly rhombic, tapering leaves. The wavy margined petals, about as long as the sepals--that is to say, half an inch long or over--curve backward at maturity. One finds the plant in bloom from April to June, according to the climate of its long range.

Perhaps the most strikingly beautiful member of the tribe is the Painted Trillium (_T. undulatum_ or _T. erythrocarpum_). At the summit of the slender stem, rising perhaps only eight inches, or maybe twice as high, this charming flower spreads its long, wavy-edged, waxy-white petals veined and striped with deep pink or wine color. The large ovate leaves, long-tapering to a point, are rounded at the base into short petioles.

The rounded, three-angled, bright red, s.h.i.+ning berry is seated in the persistent calyx. With the same range as the nodding trillium's, the Painted Wake-Robin comes into bloom nearly a month later--in May and June--when all the birds are not only wide awake, but have finished courting, and are busily engaged in the most serious business of life.

Purple Trillium, Ill-scented Wake-Robin, or Birth-root

_Trillium er.e.c.t.u.m_

_Flowers_--Solitary, dark, dull purple, or purplish red; rarely greenish, white, or pinkish; on erect or slightly inclined footstalk.

Calyx of 3 spreading sepals, 1 to 1-1/2 in. long, or about length of 3 pointed, oval petals; stamens, 6; anthers longer than filaments; pistil spreading into 3 short, recurved stigmas. _Stem:_ Stout, 8 to 16 in.

high, from tuber-like rootstock. _Leaves:_ In a whorl of 3; broadly ovate, abruptly pointed, netted-veined. _Fruit:_ A 6-angled, ovate, reddish berry.

_Preferred Habitat--Rich_, moist woods.

_Flowering Season_--April-June.