WILD, OK NATIVE I-LOIVEKS. II 



Blood-Root. — Sanguinaria Canadensis, (L.) 



(PLATE \.) 



" Here the quick-footed wolf 

 Pausing to lap thy waters, crushed the flower 

 Of Sanguinaria, from whose brittle stem 

 The red drops fell like blood. " — Bryant. 



Just at the margin of the forest, and in newly cleared ground 

 among the rich black leaf mould, may be seen late in April and May 

 the closely folded vine-shaped leaf of the Blood-root, enclosing in its 

 fold one pure white bud. 



The leaf is strongly veined beneath with pale orange veins, the 

 simple semi-transparent round leaf stalk as well as the flower scape, is 

 filled with a liquor of a bright orange red colour : break the thick fleshy 

 tuberous root and a red fluid drops from every wounded pore, whence 

 its local name " Blood-root." 



This juice is used largely by the Indian squaws in their various 

 manufactures. With it they dye the porcupine quills and moose-hair 

 both red and orange, and also stain the baskets of a better sort that 

 they offer for sale in the stores. Nor is this the only use to which it is 

 applied : they use the juice both externally in curing cutaneous eruptions 

 of the skin, and internally in other diseases. Latterly its medicinal 

 qualities have been acknowledged by the American Eclectic School of 

 Pharmacy as valuable in many forms of disease, so that we find our 

 beautiful plant to be both useful and ornamental. 



The Blood-root grows in large beds ; each knob of the root sends 

 up one leaf, and its accompanying flower bud which it kindly enfolds 

 as if to protect the fair frail blossom from the chil'ing winds and 

 showers of hail and sleet. The leaf is of a greyish or bkeish green, at 

 first the underside, which is the part exposed to view, is salmon coloured 

 veined with red, but as it expands and enlarges the outer surface 

 darkens into deeper green. The blossom is composed of many petals, 

 varying from eight to twelve. The many stamens are of a bright orange 

 yellow. The stigma is two-lobed, and the style short or sessile. The 

 seed is contained in an oblong pod of two valves. The seeds are of a 

 bright red brown colour. The ivory white petals are oblong, blunt, or 

 sometimes pointed ; the inner ones narrower than the outer, at first 

 concave, but opening out as the flower matures. Under cultivation the 

 blossom of the Blood-root increases in size, but the plant does not 

 ■seem to spread and multiply freely as in its native soil. It is one of 

 our most lovely native Spring flowers. It is a pity that, with the 

 march of civilization, we shall soon lose its fair pure blossoms. It is 

 easily cultivated, and repays care by the increase in size of the flowers 

 ripening the seeds perfectly and freely. 



