WILD FLOWERS WHITE AND GREENISH 
matic oil painting of the Father of our Country is 
annually decorated with its plumy clusters which are 
gathered in the fall. The Virgin’s Bower is a long, 
slender, leafy vine, having a round, grooved, and tough, 
woody fibred, purple stained, green stalk. The small, 
white or greenish white flowers are imperfect, and the 
staminate and pistillate blossoms grow on separate 
plants. They do not possess true petals, but the four 
or five rounded, oblong, petal-like sepals appear in their 
stead. The numerous stamens and pistils are light 
green in colour, and the latter measure an inch in length. 
The expanded flowers are an inch broad and are 
delicately fragrant. They are borne on short, slender, 
green stems, in spreading clusters, at the end of the 
vine, and from the stalk at the leaf joints. The large, 
smooth, dark green leaves are set on long stems in pairs 
and the three, or rarely five, broad, oval, short-stemmed 
leaflets terminate acutely with long, tapered points. 
They are slightly indented at the base, and are promi- 
nently ribbed. The edge or margin is cut into a few 
sharp, coarse notches or lobes. During September 
and October the pistillate flowers are followed with the 
curled, silky, silvery plumes of withered styles, which 
are even more attractive than the flowers, and they 
give the vine its greatest charm of fluffy, festooning 
drapery. This handsome plant grows about a dozen 
feet in length and spreads along its ways, groping and 
clinging by its sensitive leaf stems, which support the 
vine by hooking on to, or even coiling spirally around 
whatever happens in their course to afford favourable 
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