The Plant World 



A MONTHLY JOURNAL OF POPULAR BOTANY. 



Vol. I. JULY, 1898. No. 10 



BLUE RIDGE BLOSSOMS. 

 Bv Albert Gardticr Robinson. 



[concluded.] 



IN one little boggy meadow I found four varieties of Habenaria, 

 and made an attempt at photographing them all upon one plate. 

 I had one or two forest gardens where I could gather Amian- 



thium as I used to get cat-o'-nine-tails when I was a boy in New 

 England, and I found it on the side of Graybeard mountain at an 

 altitude of forty-eight hundred feet. 



But although these two groups possessed a special interest for 

 me, I was far from ignoring scores of other growths, some of which 

 were abundant, some uncommon, and some rare. Among them were 

 some which delighted me scarcely less than those of my special hobby. 

 I found none of the tall Iris (/. versicolor) which was so familiar to me 

 in the north, but there are few more charming blossoms than the deli- 

 cately fragrant little dwarf Iris. I found both /. verna and /. cristata. 

 I was always glad to find them. They make a dainty picture with 

 their pale blue and white standing out against their background of dead 

 leaves and wood-grasses. Of Dandelions I found but few. In some 

 places I found Passijfora incarnata in almost as rank abundance as I 

 have seen the Dandelion in other places. They grew as rankly as 

 sheep-briar, and in much the same places — in old, worn-out fields, and 

 along the railroad banks. I found also a few vines of the P. lutea I 

 noted a point of some interest regarding these two sisters. The 

 larger one faded and died very quickly after being picked, but I 

 brought in a six-foot spray of P. lutea, and it not only kept for nearly 

 two weeks, but the buds turned to blossoms, and blossoms turned to 

 seed-pods before it withered. The Galax is, I believe, strictly a moun- 

 tain growth. It is best known to many through the use of its leaves 

 for decorative purposes. It flowers with dainty pure white blossoms 

 upon a tall stalk, forming a close raceme of from one to six inches in 

 length and a half-inch or so in diameter. They mix well with some 



