THE OFCHIDS OF NEW ENGLAND, 29 
nity of proving Mr. Allen’s hypothesis, especially if he studies 
the plants as they grow. 
Whether a Lady’s Slipper comes from New England, Sibe- 
ria, or the Tropics, its lip, or labellum, as this part is usually 
called, is its most picturesque feature, and J do not think that 
any one who ever saw that of C. acaule could soon forget it. A 
countryman once described it to me as blue, ignorant of the 
fact that that is the only color Orchids are not allowed to 
wear. The botanist Pursh speaks of “its delicate and expres- 
sive purple,’ while Barton, in his Flora of North America, calls 
the petals “siskin green,” and shows a better perception of 
color than botanists generally do, though, in truth, the sepals 
and petals vary as much as the lip, and are often of a deep 
purplish or reddish brown. All flowers of a pink hue exhibit 
white varieties, and C. acaule is not uncommonly met with in 
this garb, as in the Franconia Valley; Essex Co., Mass.; Knox 
and Penobscot Cos., Maine; and in the last-named State Miss 
Kate Furbish discovered and reported in the American Nat- 
uralist two perfect blossoms growing back to back on the 
same plant—a freak repeated the following year in the White 
Mountains. Meehan, in Nateve Flowers and Ferns,* gives a 
plate representing a plant with two buds. This species is as 
variable in size as in color, T. W. Higginson, in Outdoor 
Papers characterizes it as ‘high bred,” and says he never can 
resist the feeling that each specimen is a rarity, even when 
he finds a hundred to an acre. 
In early springs, this Lady’s Slipper sometimes appears the 
first week in May in Southern Maine. June 1 has been sent 
me, on good authority, as the average date for Essex Co., 
Mass. Thoreau, giving a specific date with his well-known 
dictum, “Cypripedium not due till to-morrow,” expected it at 
Concord on the 20th of May, and it is about that date when I 
* ad Series 
