THE AMERICAN BOTANIST 



125 



that to the surprise of some, led Thoreau to say ''The Cypri- 

 pedium tomorrow." There is nothing remarkable about it. 

 One simply is en rapport with Nature. Certain signs in the 

 air, in himself, in the general environment, lead to these in- 

 tuitions. We cannot always explain fhem any more than the 

 savage can explain the way in which he g'uides one through the 

 forest. Given a certain sort of day and the gentian follows as 

 a matter of course. In the spring one can as certainly forecast 

 the arethusa and the painted cup. 



We seek the gentian in some lonely meadow or beside 

 some roadway, bordered by stone walls and shrubbery. The 

 shy blossoms may be half hidden amidst the umbered tufts of 

 Osmunda. We exclaim with Miranda — 



"The fringed curtains of thine eyes withdraw." 



Few flowers have so human and expressive a presence. One 

 feels that the meeting is sympathetic and mutual, just as he 

 does in spring when surprising the earliest hepatica. 



There are those who think that this species and the box 

 gentian (G. Andrewsii) never open. Surely they could never 

 have seen crinita in the mid-day sunlight of October. As a 

 matter of fact, both the closed and the fringed gentians open, 

 or can be persuaded to open. Bees penetrate the azure box of 

 Andrezmi^ while sunlight uncurls the fringes of its still lovelier 

 cousin. Herein a mistake is often made in gathering it. When 

 taken home, it should be put, not on the center table withdrawn 

 from windows, but in the full southern sunlight. The lashes 

 then unclose and the lobes expand — things of excjuisite beauty. 



Bryant has done for our plant what Wordsworth did for 

 the daffodil, Lowell for the birch, or Burns for the daisy. It 

 seems as if not a word could be added to or withdrawn from 

 his description. The poem is as perfect and finished as the 

 flower itself. Even in its habit and time of blooming it is 

 sharply diagnosed. It should be said, however, that the gen- 



