HABENARIA 51 



and patience and watchful eyes. It may be solved by you 

 or me. And certainly no more attractive subject of study 

 could be found than to vs^atch the life habits of this Yellow 

 Crested Orchis, with its amber horns dripping with nectar 

 and its fringed banners fluttering to the breeze. 



13. THE WHITE FRINGED ORCHIS 



Habenaria hlephariglottis (Willd.) Torrey. (Plate XXIV.) 



The White Fringed Orchis is apparently an albino 

 sister of the Yellow Fringed Orchis, and yet it has distinctive 

 characteristics that make it a constant species. Although a 

 description of the White, save in colour words, sounds 

 exactly like a description of the Yellow, yet side by side the 

 White Fringed Orchis is always a little smaller and a little 

 less robust. Its pure white flowers are smaller, its oblong 

 fringed lip is narrower, and the fringe is seldom as thick as 

 on the lip of the Yellow Orchis. These two orchids fre- 

 quently grow side by side in the same swamp, and that the 

 bees and insects are indiscriminate match makers is very 

 evident from the fact that in marshes where both grow 

 together there will be found a hybrid form with pale yellow 

 blossoms. 



Blephariglottis is the name that has recently been 

 adopted by some authors for the fringed orchids — those that 

 were the most eagerly sought and the best known in the 

 large old-named group of Habenaria. To a Greek child 

 in the woods of Hellas, did any of these fringed orchis 



