96 OUR NATIVE ORCHIDS 



and spreading, but the upper sepal and the two upper petals 

 are arched over the column (Fig. 2). 



The lip, as it stands invitingly below the entrance of the 

 older flower in the illustration, whose passage is open wide 

 enough for the bee to carry the pollen masses in, is oblong 

 and obtusely pointed. It is wa\'y, crisped around the edge 

 and has at its base two little callous knobs (Fig. 4). 



It is distinctly an October orchid, though it begins to 

 bloom in August or September. From Nova Scotia to the 

 Gulf of Mexico, and as far west as the Mississippi it is com- 

 mon in wet meadows and swamps. When Indian summer 

 warms the brown meadows and swamps, and those second 

 adventists, the violets and clover, reappear to mortals before 

 the summer dies, the Nodding Lady's-Tresses shine like 

 slim white ghosts between the grass and sedges, and shed 

 a faint, sweet almond perfume through the air. 



4. THE FRAGRANT LADY'S-TRESSES 



Gyrostachys odorata (Nutt.) Kuntze. (Plate XXXIX., Fig. 5.) 



The fragrant Lady's-Tresses is not the only one with 

 a perfume, but it is the one that receives the name odorata 

 as its characteristic sign. 



It strongly resembles the Nodding Lady's-Tresses 

 (Plate XXXIX., Fig. 6), but has a distinguishing characteristic 

 in the lip. The little thumbs at the base of the lip, the nipple- 

 shaped callosities, as the technical botanies called them, 

 are smooth and incurved in the Fragrant (Fig. 5), instead 



