WILD FLOWERS BLUE AND PURPLE 
national flower, and it has also been immortalized in 
our literatute since Bryant wrote: 
“Thou waitest late and cometh alone, 
When woods are bare and birds are flown, 
And frosts and shortening days portend 
The aged year is near his end.” 
Artists consider that the blue of the Gentian is the 
nearest approach to the colour of the sky. The leafy, 
angled, and usually branching stalk is smooth and 
grooved, and grows annually from one to three feet 
high. The clasping leaves have a heart-shaped base 
and a long, tapering point. They are thin and toothless 
and are set upon the stalk in alternating, opposite 
pairs. There is something classical about the deep, 
yase-shaped corolla, of the erect, bright blue flowers. 
They are mostly four-parted, and about two inches 
high. The four rounded and spreading lobes are 
finely fringed around the top edge, and are sensitive 
to the sunlight. They open and close with a twisting 
gesture at night, or on dull days. Each of the four- 
pointed parts of the calyx is ridged. The solitary 
flowers are borne on the tips of long and short branches, 
several of which are so closely parallel as to form a 
loose, upright group. They are found from Quebec to 
Minnesota, and south to Georgia and Iowa. 
CLOSED, OR BOTTLE GENTIAN 
Gentiana Andréwstt. Gentian Family. 
The singular flowers of the Closed Gentian have a 
curious attraction because they never open. They are 
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