8 
FLORA AND SYLVA 
SHORTIA GALACIFOLIA.* 
It was in the winter of 1788 that 
Michaux first found this plant in the 
mountains of Carohna. His imperfect 
specimens lay for years unnoticed, until 
Asa Gray saw them in Michaux's herb- 
arium in Paris, and, recognising in them 
an unknown plant, a search for it began, 
which ended only in the spring of 1877 
with the finding of a tiny patch of 
plants a few feet square, upon the banks 
of the Catawba River in Dowell's 
County, North Carolina. Michaux was 
thus vindicated when many fruitless 
hunts had thrown doubt upon the plant's 
existence, and the first find of less than 
100 tufts being soon scattered, the dis- 
trict was scoured, with the result that, 
though strictly local, the Shortia has 
proved less rare than at first supposed. 
It grows beneath trees in a light, moist 
soil of humus and leaf-mould, spread- 
ing as patches in the open thickets of 
Magnolia co7'data^ along with such little 
creepers as Mitchella, Asarum, and 
Galax, from which it takes its name. 
Plants of like nature, they are found 
together in colonies, and the strongly 
spreading Galax has even been blamed 
for the scarcity of the Shortia, for there 
is nothing else either in its habits or 
the conditions in which it is found, to 
explain its small area. 
The Shortia grows in low tufts from 
3 to 9 inches high, with shiny, ever- j 
green leaves springing from a central 
crown, veined or marbled, and taking 
a rich red or bronze-purple colour in 
autumn. Its nodding flowers, an inch 
across, are borne freely in March and \ 
April, upon red stalks set off by crim- 
son-tipped bracts, and effective as seen 
with the pure white flowers and pale 
yellow anthers. Though in the main 
borne singly, twin-flowered stems are 
not uncommon upon strong plants, and 
the delicate petals may be smooth, or 
fringed and frilled in a pretty way. On 
fading, the flowers turn a pale rose 
colour and wither away so as rarely to 
leave seed ; the plant increases by 
rambling underground stems, which 
often show their red tips many inches 
away from the parent crown. 
Many early failures with this plant 
were due to roots over-propagated, bad- 
ly packed, and often roughly handled. 
Anyone, however, who can grow 
Liinncea^ Tt^ientalis^ or Epigcea^ need 
have no fear of failing with this, and 
its great beauty and hardiness make it 
well worth a place. Some growers have 
found it do well in the peat beds devoted 
to Kalmias and Rhododendrons, where 
it makes a lovely carpet ; others have 
been successful in open places upon the 
rock-garden ; while in some districts 
partial shade or a north-east aspect 
is the most favourable. Stiff soils and 
those containing much lime are against 
it, as hindering its spread and holding 
an excess of stagnant moisture. A free, 
porous soil, in which the fibrous roots 
can make their way and wet can drain 
away freely, is essential to its well-being ; 
and given these conditions, the plant 
grows well in sandy loam, peat, or any 
light soil which does not lack moisture 
in summer ; rough, fibrous loam and 
peat, mixed with chopped sphagnum. 
* With coloured plate from a drawing by H. G. Moon, in the Highgate Nurseries. 
