VI 



MAY NOTES 



As our seasons vary from year to year, a fair 

 degree of latitude must be granted anyone who 

 attempts to classify either flowers or birds " ac- 

 cording to season." But usually the same flowers Varying 

 are contemporaneous. When I find the liverwort 

 in blossom, I begin to look for the bloodroot and 

 the adder's tongue. In some sunny hollow the 

 delicate pink-tinged and striped stars of the spring 

 beauty are almost expanded. And before many 

 days have passed the tremulous blossoms of the 

 two anemones will quiver with the least breath of 

 wind, as they nestle among the great roots of the 

 forest trees. 



In my neighborhood the columbine blossoms 

 occasionally before the end of April, yet it may Columbim 

 fairly be considered a May flower. In favorable 

 exposures it appears early in the month, while on 

 the hills it is hardly in its prime till the latter part. 

 Its pendant blossoms, with protruding yellow sta- 

 mens, and curved, spur-like petals, red without 

 and yellow within, showing vividly against their 



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