BLUE AND PURPLE WILD FLOWERS 
ing widely and giving it a slightly scrawly appearance. 
The great, handsome flower is the largest of our Violets. 
It varies in colour from red violet to blue violet. Some 
varieties have the upper petals coloured dark purple, 
and the lower ones of a lighter shade. Rarely white 
flowers are found. The stamens are orange-tipped, 
and set off the regal beauty of the flower with their 
contrast. The lower petal is slightly grooved, and 
has a prominent, flat spur. The upper petals are 
curved backward, adding greatly to the general pleas- 
ing effect of the flower. This Violet frequently blos- 
soms again in August. It does not produce stoléns. 
It is partial to dry fields and hillsides, from Maine and 
southern Ontario to Minnesota, Florida, and Missouri, 
during April, May and June. 
MEADOW VIOLET. COMMON BLUE VIOLET. 
HOODED BLUE VIOLET 
Viola cucullata. Violet Family. 
This is the most common and best known of our 
Violets, and is found everywhere within its range, 
preferring generally low grounds in woods, meadows 
and marshes from Nova Scotia to Minnesota, and 
southward to Georgia and Kansas during April, May 
and June. It readily adapts itself to all conditions, 
and varies greatly in colour, size and leaf form, accord- 
ing to its situation. In boggy lands it produces ridicu- 
lously long, flowering stems, quite necessary, however, 
to raise its blossoms to the light, above the long grasses, 
In wet, swampy woods, forms having their leaves 
340 
