WHITE GROUP 



carpels. The square stems are weak, 5 to 20 inches high. 

 They are covered with bristles turning downward, and by this 

 means the plant attaches itself to and lifts itself over other veg- 

 etation, often forming dense tangles. A persistent grower, and 

 a plant that may be met with in almost any swampy ground. 



Rough Bedstraw 



G. aspr ilium. — This species has a stronger stem than the last, 

 with many hooked bristles by which it climbs over bushes. The 

 leaves, whorled, 4 to 6 upon stem and branches, are oval or lance- 

 shaped. They often terminate in a prickle. Flower-stems forked 

 2 or 3 times. 



Banks of streams in all the Eastern States. 



Button-weed 



Dibdia. teres (name means "a thoroughfare," from the habit of 

 many species to appear by the wayside) . — Family, Madder. Color, 

 white. Flower parts in fours. An insignificant herb, generally 

 rough or hairy-stemmed, with small, whitish flowers about \ inch 

 long, with funnel-form corollas. Flowers, 1 to 3, in the leaf-axils. 

 Stem, softly hairy, 3 to 9 inches long. Leaves, opposite, long, 

 lance-shaped, stemless, stiff, rigid, with membranaceous, bristly 

 stipules connecting the leaves. Summer. 



Sandy soil along waysides from New Jersey to Florida 

 and Texas. 



Partridge Berry 



MitchelU repens (name refers to Dr. John Mitchell, a botanist 

 of the time of Linnaeus) . — Family, Madder. Color, white, some- 

 times with a pink tinge. Calyx, 4-toothed. Corolla, tubular, 

 4-lobed. Stamens, 4. Stigmas, 4, long, on a single style. The 

 flowers are close together, in pairs, their calyx-tubes later coher- 

 ing and making a double fruit, crowned with 8 teeth, filled with 

 hard nutlets. The pink-tipped flowers appear early in summer, 

 and the scarlet fruit lasts into the snowy season. Leaves, small, 

 roundish, shining, evergreen, on short petioles. June and July. 



A favorite plant growing only in woods, especially pine, 

 matted, with trailing stems on the ground, loving best to 

 nestle at the foot of trees. The flower is delicately fragrant, 

 and the fruit makes food for the birds which spend their 

 winter with us. Eastern States and southward. 



Bluets. Innocence 



Houstonia. ca.eru.lea.. — Family, Madder. Color, a bluish white, 

 with a pale-yellow center. Calyx, very short, 4-lobed, forming 



129 



