RED WILD FLOWERS 



foot. The insignificant and inconspicuous yellow 

 flowers are clustered around the base of a slender green 

 club or spadix, which is seated within a deep, leaf-like 

 cornucopia whose broad, tapering tip is gracefully 

 curved over the erect, protruding head of the green 

 " Jack." This leafy formation is known as the spathe, 

 and answers to the white floral part of the familiar 

 Calla Lily. It is green, with darker green or purple 

 stripes, and is seated upon the end of a stout stem, 

 which springs from between the sheaths of the leaf 

 stems. In the fall, the short, stiff, club-like clusters of 

 bright scarlet, berry-like fruit are very attractive. Jack 

 is found commonly in rich, moist woods and thickets 

 from Nova Scotia to Florida, and west to Ontario, 

 Minnesota, Kansas, and Louisiana. 



SKUNK CABBAGE 



Symplocarpus foetidus. Arum Family. 



Time and again it has been found convenient for 

 aesthetic purposes to disregard the comely Skunk 

 Cabbage in reckoning on the first or earliest of our 

 spring wild flowers to blossom. But the Hepatica 

 and its host of admirers must content themselves 

 with at best second place, as the first honour is honestly 

 earned by the former flower. It is very frequently 

 found in full bloom, with yellow pollen, in February, 

 and it is not at all uncommon to record its occurrence 

 in January. It is not generally known that the low- 

 twisted, one-sided, hood-like and purple stained spikes, 

 which pierce the muck and ooze, or even water and 



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