VIOLET FAMILY 
VIOLACE/E 
Everyone is familiar with the leading charac- 
teristics of the Violet family. The beautiful 
irregular flowers with five sepals and five petals, 
some of the latter being curiously modified into 
nectar spurs, are succeeded by small capsules 
within which are the numerous minute seeds. 
The one important genus of this family widely 
distributed in eastern America is that of the true 
Violets—Viola. 
May is the month of the Violets. Whether 
blue, yellow or white these are always beautiful, 
and they are perhaps more dear to most of us than 
any of the other wild flowers. Some blossom in 
April and others continue into June, but the 
height of the season of these lovely flowers comes 
in May. ; 
About thirty species of violets are found in the 
United States. Most of these are widely dis- 
tributed so that it is almost hopeless to attempt 
to name without a careful botanical key all the 
violets one may be able to find in a given region. 
I can discuss here only a few of the more abun- 
dant species. 
In classifying violets the first thing to notice 
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