102 NEW YORK STATIC MUSEUM 



leaves long-stalked; upper ones short-stalked or sessile: blades 3 to 5 inches 

 broad, parted into five to seven wedge-shaped, cleft or toothed segments, 

 the blades small at flowering time, much enlarged later. Flowers 1 to i£ 

 inches broad, with five to seven spreading, yellowish green, petallike sepals; 

 true petals minute, fifteen to twenty-five in number and much shorter than 

 the numerous yellow stamens. Fruit about 1 inch broad, consisting of 

 several small pods (follicles) each about one-fourth of an inch long and 

 tipped with a straight, slender beak of about one-fourth its length. 



A rare or local plant of low or swampy woodlands, Xew England to 

 Delaware, central and western New York to Michigan. Flowering from 

 April to June. 



Goldthread 

 Coptis trifolia (Linnaeus) Salisbury 



Plate 60a 



A low, herbaceous plant with a slender or filiform bright-yellow, bitter 

 rootstock. Leaves all basal, evergreen, long petioled, the blade reniform, 

 1 to 2 inches broad, divided to the petiole into three wedge-shaped, obtuse 

 segments, dark green, shining above, paler beneath, sharply toothed. 

 Scape one-flowered, slender; sepals five to seven, oblong, obtuse, white; 

 petals small and club-shaped; carpels three to seven, spreading, about 

 one-fourth of an inch long, on stalks of about their own length, tipped 

 with a beak. 



In damp, mossy woods and bogs, Newfoundland to Virginia and 

 eastern Tennessee, Iowa, Minnesota and Alaska. 



In the Memoirs of Bastram and Marshall, page 20, it is stated that 

 John Ellis, the eminent naturalist, in a letter to Linnaeus, dated London, 

 April 25, 1758, says: ' Mr Colden of New York, has sent Dr. Fothergill 

 a new plant, described by his daughter (Miss Jane Colden). It is called 

 Fibraurea, gold thread. This young lady merits your esteem and does 

 honor to your system. She has drawn and described 400 plants in your 

 method only. She uses the English terms. Her father has a plant called 

 after him, Coldenia; suppose you should call this Coldenella, or any other 



