CROWFOOT FAMILY 37 
on longer stems than in the open fields. Such a 
scene, overhung with the drooping catkins of the 
Birches, among whose branches the brilliant Red- 
starts are flitting, may well typify the season of 
spring. It is in just such situations that: 
“The lush marsh marigold shines like fire 
In swamps and hollows gray.” 
Woop ANEMONE. The charm of the Wood 
Anemone is perennial. In early spring its delicate 
beauty adds a peculiar delight to the borders of 
woods and untravelled roads. The modest blos- 
soms—white, save where touched to pink or pur- 
ple by the kisses of the sun—are lightly attached 
to the slender, arched pedicels, to be swayed by 
every breath of wind, or to droop more heavily 
when a bee or fly alights to sip the nectar invisible 
to human eyes. The leaves, in a whorl of three, 
spring from the single smooth stem of the plant, 
taking into their own stems much of the robust- 
ness of the main stalk and leaving but a slender 
pedicel for the support of the flower. Each leaf 
is divided into three leaflets which in their turn 
are deeply cut and lobed, permitting great free- 
dom of motion in the wind. The rootstock is 
perennial and rather slender: it is continually 
spreading out and sending up new leaves to de- 
velop later in blossom-bearing plants. As Pro- 
fessor Bigelow wrote, early in the nineteenth 
