THE PRESERVATION OF WILD FLOWERS. 251 



boy or girl, having at his disposal various kinds of land and being able 

 to gain intimate knowledge of the conditions best suited to the different 

 wild flowers which would not flourish in a city park, can experiment 

 with their cultivation, and in time find the raising of native plants a 

 useful and fascinating employment. The instilling of a love of flowers 

 will help to protect them, but this must be united with scientific 

 knowledge of their structure and relation to their environment in 

 order that the necessity for restricting the manner in which they are 

 gathered and the number that are collected Avill be evident. 



The epig£ea perhaps has suffered more from inroads upon it than 

 any other New England plant. Its sweet odor and delicate beauty 



Mountain Laurel (Kalmia latifolia). 



were in themselves attractive. Its connection with the Plymouth 

 settlement created for it a patriotic sentiment which unfortunately 

 was not united with a knowledge of the office of its underground root- 

 stock and its slow manner of growth. Bryant's poem drew to the 

 fringed gentian the attention of those who never knew before of its 

 intrinsic beauty and interesting botanical structure. It is now being 

 gathered for flower markets and becoming scarcer in meadows. 



The epigsea, the gentian and other fast disappearing flowers, though 

 difficult of cultivation, should be choicely guarded in wild flower 

 reservations, which should be to the plants of America what the large 

 country estates are to those of England. The Sharon Biological 



