468 



BOUNCING-BET AND HER FRIENDS. 



aria are variable in color. One botany will say that they 

 are white and another that they are pink, but in reality 

 their hues range from opalescent white to rose pink. The 

 latter color characterizes the flower near Chatham, Cape 

 Cod, where the plant grows abundantly near the coast, 

 making a marvelous display of color in the landscape. 

 People there say that it is the influence of the salt air 

 which enriches the color of the flower. Whatever the 

 reason, it here is of so much brighter a hue than else- 

 where, that at a little distance those familiar with it 

 farther inland would not recognize it in the masses of 

 brilliant pink bloom which, during early August, con- 

 trast so well with the various greens of the surrounding 

 under-shrubs, and the stretches of warm-tinted beach 

 sands. 



When I was a child, the tawny orange ephemeral lilies, 

 in company with the daffodils, sweet-williams, clove-pinks, 

 periwinkle, China-asters, phlox, crown-imperials, tulips 

 and the red peony, still kept a place in our own and our 

 neighbors' garden-beds. The last-named flower was 

 highly prized a generation ago, and a farm or village 

 matron whose garden could not boast of the flaunting 

 "piny" esteemed it a great favor if a more fortunate 

 neighbor gave her a "toe" — toes being the provincial 

 name for the tubers. And if one of the ugly little round 

 peony-buds was struck off before blooming by some in- 

 vestigating rooster it was counted a greater misfortune 

 than if a whole bush of the sweet old-fashioned double 

 roses had been despoiled. Many of its friends of earlier 

 days yet find garden homes, but the poor old lily was 

 driven forth long ago, and few now care for it, save the 

 children, who like to braid its long, sword-shaped leaves 

 into "cat-ladders" and to play with the slender stems 

 and quickly fading blossoms whose petals bring their 

 gaudy colors all the way from the warm skies of the 

 Levant. A friend calls these day-lilies graveyard-lilies, 

 because churchyards are among their favorite haunts. 

 Not far from the statue that commemorates the first 

 battle of the American revolution, just below the spot 

 marked by stone posts and an inscription telling that 

 some British soldiers are buried here, a bed of these same 

 old lilies has spread itself, as if piously to mark the un- 

 cared-for stranger-graves. 



The tiger-lily has as yet only taken to the highways 

 and fields in certain localities. On the outskirts of one 

 of the very early settled towns, beside a slow-flowing 

 tidal river of the Chesapeake Bay, it has quite run wild 

 and the splendid flowers grow abundantly among the 

 beautiful mallows, graceful sedges and grasses that help 

 to make up the remarkably interesting and varied flora 

 of that region. The strong likeness between this oriental 

 lily, brought all the way from China, and our beautiful 

 wild American Turk's-cap suggests their common an- 

 cestry. The shapes of leaves and flowers and the mark- 

 ings of the latter are much alike. What an interesting 

 chapter in heredity would that be which could, in truth- 

 ful detail, outline the long ancestry of even one or two 

 of our most highly developed flowering plants ! 



In the days of our grandmothers, the tansy was very 



generally cultivated as an herb in the kitchen-garden, 

 and even now in country places, it finds room there. It 

 has never been prized as a flowering plant, but the ex- 

 quisitely-cut frond-like leaves, of rich green, and the prim 



little gold buttons that make up 

 the flower- clusters are really 

 very beautiful. This clean, 

 healthy - smelling herb now 

 grows in dense miniature thick- 

 ets along many a New England 

 by-road, and finds lodgment in 

 fence-corners and in pasture- 

 lands. In eastern Massachusetts 

 herb-gatherers cut it with the 

 reaping-hook and carry it off by 

 the wagon-load. 



A friend gifted in flower- 

 painting once told me that she 

 thought flowers should always be painted outdoors as 

 they lost much by being brought away from all their 

 own familiar surroundings. Doubtless this rule would 

 hold good with the toad-flax, if the artist wished to give 



Bouncing-Bet. 



(Sapunaria officinalis. ) 



