CARROT FAMILY 



appear many slender, fibrous roots have been produced. 

 It is about the size of a hazelnut and is sunken from 

 two to four inches beneath the surface. It sends up a 

 simple stem which bears, usually, two compound leaves 



that show themselves at 

 or a little above the sur- 

 face as the bloom ap- 

 pears. The plant is one 

 of the UmbellifercB and 

 its bloom is a compound 

 umbel, of three or four 

 small umbels. Each of 

 these consists of four or 

 five florets, each floret 

 wdth five white petals, 

 and less than a quarter 

 of an inch across. The 

 stamens are five, pro- 

 truding; filaments white, 

 and anthers dark purple. 

 The styles are two and 

 white. So white are the 

 petals and so dark the anthers, that the country name, 

 Pepper-and-Salt, is well deserved. 



In northern Ohio the plant can be hopefully looked 

 for in maple-sugar camps and usually blooms at the 

 time of sugar-making. By the first of May its chosen 

 haunts are covered with a lace-like canopy four inches 

 from the ground, made of the spreading, delicately 

 divided leaves, and among them are the tiny brown 

 fruits of the carrot clan. By June its race is run, its 

 foliage dies, and deep in the ground a bulb awaits in 

 the darkness another spring. 



i68 



Harbinger-of-Spring. Erigenia hulhosa 



