30 FLOWERS OF THE BOGS AND MARSHES 



leaves are ternate or 3-lobed, trifoliate (hence trifoliata). The leaflets 

 are blunt, entire, with very short stalks, equal, inversely egg-shaped or 

 oblong, wavy, the ultimate nerves having the tips free within the larger 

 areoles. The sheath of the leaf-stalk is long and narrow, and not so 

 long as the many-flowered scape. 



The flowers are in a raceme with a leaf opposite it, white or pink, 

 or flesh-colour, the upper surface of the corolla clothed with beautiful 

 whitish filaments, or densely fringed within or bearded. The flower- 



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<&i{j* . 



Photo. B Hanley 



BOG BEAN (Menvanthes trifoltata, L.) 



stalks are long, the ultimate ones short, stiff, spreading. The bracts 

 are short, blunt, and broad. The sepals are oblong, blunt. The 

 stamens are reddish. The capsule is blunt-pointed, many-seeded, the 

 seeds small, polished. 



The plant is i ft. high. It flowers, when it does flower, which it 

 does not always do, in July, but I have seen it in bud in April. The 

 plant is perennial, propagated from cuttings, and worth cultivating. 



Honey is secreted by the base of the ovary. The flowers are 

 usually heterostylic or dimorphic, a long-styled and a short-styled form 

 being found; but not everywhere, for in West Greenland plants of 

 homomorphic type occur, with the pistil and stamens of the same 



