122 THE AMERICAN BOTANIST 



The curious flowers of this group with their five petals 

 turned to "spurs" or nectaries, Kre borne on slender pedicels 

 and have an exceedingly light and airy appearance which is 

 heightened by the much-divided leaves not so unlike the leaves 

 of the maidenhair fern in form. The slender nectaries make 

 the flowers attractive to butterflies and long tongued bees 

 and probably have earned the plant its name of honeysuckle. 

 The older and better- founded term is columbine from colmnba 

 a dove in allusion to the hooked spurs of a common European 

 species in which a vivid imagination may fancy a group of 

 doves. The scientific appellation of the group is Aqiiilcgia. 



Although all columbines have spurs, there is considerable 

 diversity in their size and shape. Some are scarcely longer 

 than the sepals, while others are several times as long. The 

 location and arrangement of these spurs or nectaries arc 

 plainly to secure cross-pollination of the flowers, but the bees 

 often do not play fair and instead of exploring the nectaries 

 as they should, bite through the tip and thus secure the sweets 

 without performing any useful work in return. 



The commonest columbine in cultivation is Aqiiilcgia vul- 

 garis; in fact, the specific name indicates as much. It is a 

 native of Siberia and has long been cultivated in Europe 

 where it has produced many forms that are now spread 

 widely in the world. Though considered a garden plant in 

 America, it has become a wilding again in some places. There 

 are several other forms in Siberia, but the genus is not C(^n- 

 fined to the Old World. It circles the earth in the North 

 .Temperate Zone and tlie majority of the species are Amer- 

 ican. The latest monographer lists twenty-five species from 

 our part of the world. All but one are Western. 



The species of Eastern America is the wild red columbine 

 {Aqiiilcgia Canadensis). It takes readily to cultivation and 



