MILKWORT FAMILY 



Pistil. — Ovary two-celled; style long and somewhat 

 curved. 



Fruit. — A small, flat, two-seeded pod; the seeds are ap- 

 pendaged with two or three awl-shaped lobes. 



Pollinated by bees and bee-like flies. Nectar-bearing. 



The Polygala blos- 

 som is beautiful in 

 form and color, but 

 very puzzling in struc- 

 ture. This is due to 

 the fact that the five 

 sepals are neither sym- 

 metrical in shape nor 

 alike in color. Three 

 are greenish and of 

 sepal-like character, 

 two drop their sepal 

 look, become larger 

 than the others and 

 rose-colored — in short, 

 group themselves with 

 the petals and appar- 

 ently become corolla. 



The three petals also are unsymmetrical — more or 

 less grown together, and the middle one develops a 

 keel and a crest %vhich is beautifully fringed. In color 

 the flower is rose or rarely pure white. Probably 

 there is no flow^ering plant, ^Yhatever color its corolla 

 may normally be, that does not at some time develop 

 an albino. 



Professor William W. Bailey reports this as one of 

 the abundant May blossoms of New England, found in 



140 



Fringed Polygala. Polygala paucifdlia 



