THE WILD GARDEN. 175 
won the tribute it deserves as an early riser, vying with the he- 
patica, as i¢ does, in its anticipation of spring. I have gathered 
it, with its compact tiny cushions of bloom on the naked stems 
barely two inches high, in early March, when it had plainly stolen 
a march on the liverworts in its immediate vicinity. But I have 
never chanced to pick it beneath the snow, which I have done 
with both the arbutus and hepatica, having found a ruddy cluster 
of the former as early as February. But the following experi- 
ence, quoted from a letter from a friend bearing date of January 
25, 1887, Boston, as far as I know beats the record in driving 
back the vernal bloom towards the season of the asters, and 
which, greeting the festal flags of the December witch-hazels, 
carries the possible wild-flower garland all round the calendar: 
“The gth of December,” writes my friend, * Mr. , my wife’s 
father, said to me that he felt quite confident that he could go 
to the woods in Melrose and bring home hepatica blossoms. I 
had found them myself in January, but it was after a week or 
more of warm weather, with the ground bare of snow. In this 
case, however, a foot or more of snow had fallen a day or two 
before, preceded by icy cold weather; so I said, ‘No,’ not sup- 
posing he had any thought of putting his confidence to the test. 
But he took the train, went directly to the spot where grew a 
cluster of plants which he well knew, dug away the snow, picked 
an open blossom, and brought it home.” 
In the same letter my observant friend continues: “A year 
ago, in taking a walk from Fabyan’s to the Crawford House, I 
discovered a plant of meadow-rue (7halictrum cornut:) having 
purple blossoms. A very distinct variety it seemed to me—a 
very decided color; not so soft and graceful as the blossoms of 
the white, but having a quite pleasing effect. The stem of the 
plant was also of a dark color. You may be sure I was surprised 
and delighted, as I had never heard of such a thing. I took the 
root to add to my collection of native plants growing in my gar- 
den. Last summer the plant blossomed handsomely. I took the 
flowers to Horticultural Hall, but no one there had ever seen 
them, and no description or allusion can I find in any botany. I 
