42 SARRACENIACE^. Sarracenia. 



smooth and somewhat polished ; the lower part furnished with very slender hairs pointing 

 downward. Scape 10-16 inches high, smooth. Flower about two inches in diameter. 

 Bracts ovate, about four lines long, resembling a small exterior caly.x or involucre. Sepals 

 ovate, obtuse, of a dull green color mi.xSd with purple. Petals panduriform, purple, with a 

 broad claw, the lamina inflected over the stigma. Stamens concealed by the ample stigma : 

 filaments short : anthers large, oblong : pollen globular, extremely minute. Style about a line 

 long : stigma an inch or more in diameter, a little concave in the centre, marked on the upper 

 surface with five radiating lines, which terminate in notched angles or lobes. The true stigmas 

 are five in number, and situated at the angles of the large peltate body. Capsule roundish, 

 obtusely 5-angled, the surface rough like shagreen. Seeds very numerous, about a line in 

 length, covering the large placenta that project into the cells : raphe very broad and somewhat 

 cristate ; testa rough, thick and crustaceous. 



Swamps, particularly where Sphagnum abounds : rather common. Fl. May - June. Fr. 

 August. The variety with yellowish flowers was found in Junius, Seneca county, by Dr. Sart- 

 well, and hitherto has not been observed in any other part of the State. It was first discovered, 

 about twenty-five years ago, in Northampton, Massachusetts, by the late Prof. Eaton, who 

 at first regarded it as a mere variety of S. purpwea, but afterwards he described it as a dis- 

 tinct species. It does not differ essentially from the common variety, except in the color of 

 the flower. The tv^'o kinds of foliage noticed by Mr. Eaton are not uncommon in the purple- 

 flowered form ; the new and imperfectly developed leaves, and the persistent leaves of the 

 previous season, being found on the same specimen. 



The genus Sarracenia (of which there are six species known, all of them peculiar to North 

 America, and five of them growing exclusively in the southern States) is remarkable for 

 its hollow, pitcher-form leaves, and for the arrangement of the hairs upon the lamina and in 

 the tube. The cavity is often found partly full of water, which seems to be derived from 

 rain and dews ; for there is no evidence of its being secreted by the hairs of the tube, as sup- 

 posed by Lindlcy. The cavity always contains dead insects, and is sometimes one-third filled 

 with them, so that in warm weather I have known their putrescence to render the swamp, 

 where the plant abounds, highly offensive. The insects, in creeping over the hairy surface 

 of the lamina, find it difficult to return, in consequence of their feet becoming wedged in the 

 short stiff hairs which extend beyond the orifice. Passing over the smooth upper surface of 

 the tube, they arc again detained by the hairs below, where they are either drowned in the 

 water usually contained in the lube, or starved to death. "What purpose, in the economy of 

 the plant, is thus accomplished, has never been determined. — S. purpurea is, in some parts 

 of the State, known by the name of the American Pitcher-plant ; in other places, it is called 

 the Huntsman's Cup. 



