IRIS VERSICOLOR. 



BLUE FLAG. 



NATURAL ORDER, IRIDACE/E. 



Iris versicolor, Linnaeus. — Stem stout, angled on one side ; leaves sword-shaped (three 

 quarters of an inch wide); ovary obtusely triangular with the sides flat ; flowers (two and 

 one half to three inches long) short peduncled, the funnel-form tube shortei tfian the ovary; 

 pod oblong, turgid, with rounded angles. (Gray's Manual of the Botany if the Northern 

 United States. See also Darlington's Flora Cestrica, Wood's Class-Book of Botany, and 

 Chapman's Flora of the Southern United States.) 



HE genus to which the Blue Flag belongs was called 

 Iris, which is the Greek name for rainbow, on account 

 of the brilliant hues displayed by the flowers of some of the 

 species. This brilliancy of color is characteristic of all the 

 American species comprised in the genus, and the plant which 

 we are about to examine does special honor to the name. The 

 hues of the flowers of the Blue Flag are not, indeed, exactly 

 those of the rainbow, but they are quite as varied ; and in this 

 respect the specific name of the plant, versicolor, is very appro- 

 priate. The great beauty of the Iris versicolor has always won 

 admiration, and has frequently called forth happy lines from the 

 poets. Longfellow, with the popular idea of the relationship of 

 our plant to the Lily present in his mind, thus sings of it : — 



" Beautiful Lily, dwelling by still rivers, 

 Or solitary mere, 

 Or where the sluggish meadow brook delivers 

 Its waters to the weir, 



Thou laughest at the mill, the whir and worry 



Of spindle and of loom, 

 And the great wheel that toils amid the hurry 



And rushing of the flume. 



