154 GENTIANA ANDREWSII. — CLOSED GENTIAN. 



were open under a warm sun, close in a few minutes when visited 

 by a sudden snow-storm; and again open as rapidly when the sun 

 came out and turned to water the fallen snow. It is, indeed, re- 

 markable that this one species should resist this solar influence. 

 Of course, its time of bloomino- is not favorable to its beino- 

 caught in a snow-storm in spring. As Bryant has said of 

 another species of Gentian : 



" Thou comest not when violets lean 

 O'er wandering brooks and springs unseen, 

 Or columbines, in purple drest, 

 Nod o'er the ground-birds' hidden nest." 



But it appears in September, when other flowers are bethinking 

 of going to their wintry rest. In Pennsylvania, from whence the 

 specimen illustrated was taken, it is one of the latest fall-flowers 

 that are found in open grassy places. It seldom grows here in any 

 one spot in quantity sufficient to give a marked character to the 

 autumnal scenery, and yet it is sufficiendy abundant to prevent its 

 being overlooked wherever it exists at all. Its beauty has 

 attracted the attention of florists ; and it is often met with under 

 culture, where it seems to thrive very well without any special 

 care, and to prefer much drier and more open places than those 

 in which it is naturally found. In England it seems to be as well 

 appreciated as here. Mr. Robinson, in his work on "Alpine 

 Flowers," tells us it is regarded as more beautiful than Gentiana 

 Saponarfa, and more worthy of culture. 



Botanically, it was confused with G. Saponaria, or allied species, 

 by the earlier botanists. Rafinesque, in his " Medical Flora," 

 published in 1818, seems to have ^een the first to note its true 

 distinction, and named it Gentiana clansa — literally, the " closed 

 Gentian;" and it would seem, under the law of priority, that this 

 should be its prevailing name. But Professor Gray, and Amer- 

 ican botanists generally, follow Grisebach, who, in 1843, wrote a 

 monograph of the order, in which he gave it the name of Gen- 

 tiana Andreiusii, in honor of Henry Andrews, who edited the 

 "Botanical Repository," an illustrated work, published in London 



