50 FAMILIES OF FLOWERING PLANTS. 
The Lily family is noteworthy as containing a large proportion 
not only of our most beautiful wild flowers, but also of the various ex- 
otics which we cultivate for early blooming. Thus the little squill 
(Scilla) hangs out its blue bells with the first soft breaths of spring, 
and is followed in quick succession by the showy Tulips and Hyacinths, 
the Fritillarias and the stately Crown-imperial (/mperialis). In the 
woods at about the same season blossoms that exquisite flower which 
has so long staggered under the unmeaning and inaccurate name of 
‘‘Dog’s-tooth Violet,’ as if 
anything in the floral world 
could be more remote in ap- 
pearance as well as structure 
than the lily and the true 
violet. The plant is some- 
_ times, but not often, called 
by the quite appropriate 
term ‘‘Adder’s Tongue,’’ but 
it might be still better called 
what it is, namely, an Ery- 
thronium. The Lilies of the 
field and garden (Lilium), 
the old-fashioned Day-lilies 
(Hemerocallis) and the tall 
Yuccas are too well-known to 
need more than a passing 
comment. I presume that 
Fra. 44.—Various species of Lilium: L. canadense; ane core however, would 
L. pardalinum; L. philadelphicum; L. superbum, scarcely be admitted as a true 
; Liliaceous plant except by 
botanists. Nevertheless it belongs there, and the small flowers, when 
examined under a lens, are really quite lily-like in appearance. 
The bulbs of many of the lilyworts, as they were called by Lind- 
ley, are mucilazinous and contain medicinal properties. The well 
known drug syrup of squills is obtained from the South European 
Scilla maritima. The onion and its varieties, botanically known as 
species 6f Alliwm, is one of our most. familiar garden vegetables. 
Aloes are obtained from Aloe, a genus extensively distributed in Africa; 
‘while the original ‘‘dragon’s-blood,’? a drug now obtained from 
numerous plants, was derived from Dracena Draco. 
