The Plant World 



A MONTHLY JOURNAL OF POPULAR BOTANY. 



Vol. l JUNE, 1898. No. 9. 



BLUE RIDGE BLOSSOMS. 

 By Albert Gardner Robinson. 



1AM not a skilled botanist. I am only a flower-lover. But I have 

 spent a "world of happy days" on the hillsides and in the val- 

 leys among the mountains of western North Carolina, in search 



of those 



" Flowers worthy of Paradise, which not Bice art, 

 In beds and curious knots, but Nature bron 

 Poured forth profuse on hill and dale and plain." 



It is probable that some of my readers are not without experience 

 in that beautiful and interesting section. It is equally probable 

 that there are many who have not been so fortunate. 



Such a list of the flora of any section as it is possible to give in 

 a magazine article, must, of necessity, be incomplete — suggestive 

 rather than exhaustive. This obtains with marked force when it re- 

 lates to such a district as that which forms the basis for this paper, 

 for two reasons. One reason is the space which would be required 

 for such a list — the other, that nothing short of a thorough and sys- 

 tematic search covering several years, and involving the time and 

 service of a considerable number of searchers, would make an ex- 

 haustive list possible. A great portion of the more than twelve 

 thousand square miles of mountain region in western North Carolina is 

 wild and rough. Comparative!}^ little of it has been thoroughly ex- 

 plored, botanically. A wide variety of conditions is presented, and 

 the flora of the section embraces plants which are almost semi-tropical, 

 such as the Yucca filainentosa, and others which are semi-alpine, such 

 as the Loiseleiiria procumbens. There are flowers which are said to 

 grow nowhere else in the world, such as one or two of the Orchids 

 which grow in the vicinity of Roan mountain. Some, which are rare 

 or uncommon elsewhere, are abundant there. I have gathered the 

 Ltlium Grayi, with its pendant bells of " deep reddish orange," as it 



