U4 



THE ORCHIDS OF NEW ENGLAND. 



smaller flowers less conspicuously notched and fringed, while 

 there is a variety, holopctala, that has these adornments re- 

 duced to a minimum. H. blephariglottis closely resembles its 

 gayer sister in appearance and structure, and by reason of its 

 purity is quite as fascinating. Gray considers these species to 

 be " chiefly remarkable for having their viscid discs projecting 

 much more even than in H. orbiculata, 

 the anterior part of the anther-cell and 

 the supporting arm of the stigma united 

 tapering and lengthened to such a 

 degree that the viscid discs are as if 

 raised on a pedicel, projecting consider- 

 ably beyond the rest of the column. 

 ^%Sl The anther-cells are nearly horizontal, 

 greatly divergent, but inclined somewhat 

 inward at the ends ; so that the discs are 

 presented forward and slightly inward, 

 at least in H. blcpliariglottis, or in H. 

 ciliaris more directly forward. Evi- 

 dently these projecting discs are to be 

 stuck to the head of some nectar-suck- 

 ing insect. The stigma, which is rather 

 small, is between the lateral arms, in the 

 same horizontal line with the discs : the 

 discs are small but quite sticky and di- 

 rectly affixed to the extremity of a stalk 

 which in just proportion to the forward 

 elongation of the anther-cell, etc., is re- 

 markably long and slender, twice or thrice the length of the 

 pollen-mass it bears. Upon removal, a slight bending or 

 turning of the slender stalk brings the pollen-mass into posi- 

 tion for reaching the stigma. The discs in ordinary flowers of 

 H. ciliaris, are about a line and a half apart (the English line 

 is the twelfth part of an inch), the slender spur an inch long, 



Fig. 35. — Yellow Fringed- 



Orchis. 



Habenaria ciliaris. 



