Yellow and Orange 



rana = a frog. Many other members grow in marshes, it is true, 

 but this ranunculus lives after the manner of its namesake, some- 

 times immersed, sometimes stranded on the muddy shore. Two 

 types of leaves occur on the same stem. Their waving filaments, 

 which make the immersed leaves look fringy, take every advan- 

 tage of what little carbonic-acid gas is dissolved under the sur- 

 face. Moreover, they are better adapted to withstand the water's 

 pressure and possible currents than solid blades would be. The 

 floating leaves which loll upon the surface to take advantage of 

 the air and sunlight, expand three, four, or five divisions, 

 variously lobed. On this plant we see one set ,of leaves perfectly 

 adapted to immersion, and another set to aerial existence. The 

 stem, which may measure several feet in length, roots at the 

 joints when it can. Range from the Mississippi and Ontario 

 eastward to the Atlantic Ocean. 



The White Water-Crowfoot (Batrachmm trichophyllum) — 

 Ranunculus aquatilis of Gray — has its fine thread-like leaves 

 entirely submerged ; but the flowers, like a whale, as the old 

 conundrum put it, come to the surface to blow. The latter 

 are small, white, or only yellow at the base, where each petal 

 bears a spot or little pit that serves as a pathfinder to the flies. 

 When the water rises unusually high, the blossoms never open, 

 but remain subrherged, and fertilize themselves. Seen under 

 water, the delicate leaves, which are little more than forked hairs, 

 spread abroad in dainty patterns ; lifted out of the water these 

 flaccid filaments utterly collapse. In ponds and shallow, slow 

 streams, this common plant flowers from June to September 

 almost throughout the Union, the British Possessions north of us, 

 and in Europe and Asia. 



The Water Plantain Spearwort {R. obtusiusculus) — R. alis- 

 maefolius of Gray — flecks the marshes from June to August with 

 its small golden flowers, which the merest novice knows must 

 be kin to the buttercup. The smooth, hollow stem, especially 

 thick at the base, likes to root from the lower joints. A pecu- 

 liarity of the lance-shaped or oblong lance-shaped leaves is that 

 the lower ones have petioles so broad where they clasp the stem 

 that they appear to be long blades suddenly contracted just above 

 their base. 



Barberry; Pepperidge-bush 



(Berberis vulgaris) Barberry family 



Ftowers — Yellow, small, odor disagreeable, 6-parted, borne in 

 drooping, many-flowered racemes from the leaf axils along 

 arching twigs. Stem : A much branched, smooth, gray shrub, 



29s 



