HARPER'S GUIDE TO WILD FLOWERS 



often twisted. Leaves, short, i to 3 inches long, smooth, loosely 

 cellular, transparent, grass-like; none on the flower-stems. 



This singular aquatic is not very common. In the ponds 

 where it grows from August to October, under overhanging 

 trees, the surface of the water will be dotted with the white 

 flowers, and where the water is shallow the tips of the leaves 

 can be seen. Its range is from Newfoundland to Texas. (See 

 illustration, p. 45.) 



Mud Plantain 



Heteranthera reniformis. — Family, Pickerel-weed. Color, white 

 or pale blue. Leaves, kidney-shaped or heart-shaped, with long, 

 sheathing petioles. A low, creeping-stemmed herb, with a spathe 

 of few flowers, which perish in a day. The flower-tube is 6- 

 divided. There are 3 stamens, 2 with yellow anthers, 1 with a 

 greenish anther. A leaf at first covers the flowers, from the 

 base of which, when ready to bloom, they emerge. Summer. 



Connecticut to Xew Jersey and southward. 

 Devil's Bit. Blazing Star 



ChamaeUrium luteam. — Family, Lily. Stamens and pistils on 

 different plants. Sepals, 6, persistent after withering. Six sta- 

 mens with white anthers. The fertile flowers contain only the 

 rudiments of stamens. Styles, 3, long, club-shaped, stigmatic 

 along one side. Capsule oblong, about h inch long, 3-lobed and 

 3-valved. Leaves, upper ones lance-shaped or linear, flat, sessile, 

 or short-petioled; the lower broad at apex, obtuse, tapering into 

 narrow petioles. May to July. 



A long stem. 4 feet high or less, rises from a tuberous root- 

 stock, bearing a bractless raceme several inches long, of 

 small, feathery, white, staminate flowers. The raceme of 

 pistillate flowers on a shorter stem is stiff and erect. 



Massachusetts to Florida and westward. 

 Fly Poison 



Amianthium muscaetoxicum. — Family, Lily. Perianth of 6 

 white divisions which become greenish with age. They are 

 spreading, conspicuous, making a simple, dense raceme. Stamens, 

 with thread-like filaments as long as the sepals. Fruit, a 3 -horned 

 capsule. Leaves, from base of flower - stem, linear, grass - like, 

 rather long, a few on the stem reduced to mere bracts. Stem, 

 18 inches to 4 feet high, from a coated bulb. June and July. 



Open woods, with a wide range from Long Island west- 

 ward to Pennsylvania, to Kentucky and Arkansas. Found 

 among the mountains of Virginia. 



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