82 THE AMERICAN BOTANIST. 



do not seem to wholly acclimatize them. Thev are hardier 

 than the natives. They do not take up the Yankee cus- 

 toms. But when this unseasonable bloomintr occurs 

 among indigenous things, it is remarkable. 



Generally the discoverer, not necessarily young, thinks 

 when he finds these winter bloomers that he is a modern 

 DeGamo, Columbus, Americus, or Balboa. He either 

 rushes into print or proclaims his experience from the 

 house-tops. It is as with albino forms of flowers— usually 

 colored ; it is hard to convince the finder that his observa- 

 tion is not original. Where is the old botanist who has 

 not had white gentians or cardinal flowers sent him as 

 things extraordinary ? 



Dr. Asa Gray used to sa^' that he proposed if he lived 

 to issue a new edition ot the Manual, to insert in the pre- 

 face a remark "Always expect a white form of any flower." 

 Certainh' it would save postage stamps and disappoint- 

 ment. The world, even by conservative estimates, has 

 existed a good while, and during the time many persons 

 have seen things, and man3^ things have happened. It is 

 well to remember this. 



Our deadest months as to real flowers, are, no doubt, 

 January and Februar3', Then, if ever, come bloomless 

 days. But to show what may happen, skunk-cabbage 

 now and then pokes through the ice in February, or Draba 

 verna ripens a pod. Often has the writer seen the silver- 

 leaf maple in full bloom on Valentine's T>'Ay. A little un- 

 usual weather, too, will cause the pendant catkins of elder 

 and hazel to shed their pollen. 



Apart from actual flowers, winter shows many forms 

 ofhfe. Certain low alg£E and fungi show themselves on 

 tree trunks, and moist banks, fences, etc. More especially 

 after a rain do the northern sides of trees show what 

 George Eliott calls "Nature's powdery paint." Flowers 

 in the common sense, these have not, but they do possess 

 highly organized means of reproduction. Again, lichens, 

 the pioneers of vegetable progress, which recent observa- 

 tion show to be dual existences, alga and fungus in com- 

 bination, are much in evidence in winter. 



