NATIVE WILD FLOWERS 



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and in light vegetable mould forms considerable beds; the 

 roots are white, slender and fibrous; it is one of our early 

 May flowers, though, unless the month be warm and genial, 

 it will delay its opening somewhat later. In olden times, 

 when the herbalists gave all kinds of fanciful names to the 

 wild plants, they would have bestowed such a name as 

 " Herbe Innocence " upon our modest little forest flower. 



LARGE BLUE FLAG FLEUR-DE-LUCE Iris versicolor (L.). 



" Lilies of all kinds, 

 The fleur-de-luce being one." 



Winter's Tale. 



This beautiful flower abounds all through Canada and 

 forms one of the ornaments of our low sandy flats, marshy 

 meadows and overflowed lake shores; it delights in wet, 

 muddy soil, and often forms large clumps of verdure in 

 half-dried ponds and similar localities. Early in spring, as 

 soon as the sun has warmed the waters after the melting of 

 the ice, the sharp sword-shaped leaves, escaping from the 

 sheltering sheath that enfolded them, pierce the moist 

 ground and appear in the form of beds of brilliant verdure 

 concealing the swampy soil and pools of stagnant water 

 below. Late in the month of June the bursting buds of 

 rich purple begin to unfold, peeping through the spathe 

 that envelopes them. A few days of sunshine and the grace- 

 ful petals, so soft and silken in texture, so variable in 

 shades of color, unfold : the three outer ones, reflexed, droop 

 gracefully downwards, while the three innermost, which are 

 of paler tint, sharper and stiffer, stand erect and conceal 

 the stamens and petal-like stigmas, which lie behind them 

 an arrangement so suitable for the preservation of the 

 fructifying organs of the flower that we cannot fail to 



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