POISONOUS QUALITIES OF LADIES SLIPPEK. 



189 



Fasciated Flower Stall- in CycJainen indcrocepJialum. From 



the Botanic Garden of the 

 University of Pennsylvania 

 on March 2(3, 190:3, I oh- 

 taiiied two examples which 

 display united tlower-stalks. 

 In one specimen, the pedun- 

 cles were fasciated to within 

 an inch of the calyx, while in 

 the other the fusion was l)e- 



Figure 37. 



twccn the l)ases of the calyces. 



Splif Coftjledons ill IpdiiiDCd pid-piirca. The specimen dis- 

 playing this condition was obtained in the laboratory among 

 some seedlings raised for class use on July 8, 1904. One cotyle- 

 don, as shown in Figure 37, was of the usual form, the other was 

 divided into two cotyledons, each with a distinct petiole. 



University of Pennsylvania. 



A XOTE OX THE POISONOUS QUALITIES OF THE 

 YELLOW LADIES' SLIPPER. 



By Otto E. Jennings. 



That the beautiful Yellow Ladies' Slipper, Cypripedium 

 Jiirsiihnii Miller, is to many people quite poisonous by contact, 

 is apparently not well known among amateur botanists, or even 

 among some of our more strictly technical friends. 



In two contributions in Volume I of the Minnesota Botan- 

 ical Studies (1893-1898), Dr. D. T. MacDougal mentions a 

 number of species of plants of Minnesota which are to many 

 people more or less poisonous to the touch and adds to these the 

 three Ladies' Slippers — Cypripedium reginae Walter, C. kirsii- 

 fiim Miller, and C. par rifi arum Salisbury — citing also previous 

 reports from several sources as to the poisonous character of these 

 orchids and himself adding considerable experimental evidence 

 along this line. 



