WHITE GROUP 



and evaporated, made into round balls, and placed on slats 

 to dry. The opium balls are then ready for market. 



Opium contains morphine, narcotine, codeine, thebaine, 

 papaverine, etc. Its use in medicine is well known. The 

 Romans understood its medicinal properties. Virgil speaks 

 of the plant, and of its sleep-producing capacities. 



Dutchman's Breeches 



Dicentra Cucullaria (2 -spurred). — Family, Fumitory. Color, 

 white, tipped with pale yellow. Sepals, 2, small, scale-like. 

 Petals, 4, slightly joined; the 2 outer forming 2 spurs, spreading 

 apart, longer than the short flower-stalk. Stamens, 6, Pistil, 1. 

 Leaves, on slender petioles, from rootstocks, thrice - compound 

 and variously cut into long and narrow divisions. April. 



Rich woods in the Northern States, as far south as South 

 Carolina. The plant grows from a scaly bulb, composed of 

 grain-like tubers. 



The odd flowers grow in a raceme on leafless scapes. One 

 of the prettiest of our wood-dwellers. Is it a mere coinci- 

 dence that so many of our early spring flowers are of the 

 fragile, delicate sort, while summer and autumn bring heavier 

 bloom, as if the nature hand were at first hesitating and 

 timid, and later acquired a bolder stroke? The wild sun- 

 flower, for example, with bur-marigolds and tall asters, can 

 only be associated with fall, while saxifrages, violets, spring 

 beauties, hepaticas, fumitory, and pale corydalis seem from 

 their very nature to be blown from the breath of spring. 

 (See illustration, p. 78.) 



A cultivated species of this Family, Dielytra, is well known 

 from its blood-red, spurred, heart-shaped corolla. One of 

 its common names is bleeding heart. 



Squirrel Corn 



D, canadensis. — Found more in northerly woods. Under- 

 ground shoots bear yellow, small tubers, resembling grains of 

 corn. The flowers are white or greenish, tinged with pink, with 

 short spurs, and a prominent crest on the two inner petals. Leaves 

 like the last. A delicate fragrance, as of hyacinths, pervades 

 these dear little flowers. 



Whitlow Grass 

 Drkba <verna. — Family, Mustard. Sepals and petals, 4, the latter 

 deeply 2 -cleft. Pistil, 1. Pod s on long stalks, oval, pointed. Leaves, 

 all tufted at the root, oblong or lance-shaped. April and May. 



77 



