30 
THE AMERICAN BOTANIST. 
two small disc-like bodies had attached themselves firmly 
to the nail. On attempting to remove the nail I found 
that to each disc was fastened a short stalk or cord 
which could be drawn out to quite a length, an inch or 
more, like a piece of india-rubber or a small coiled spring. 
This coil was so elastic that it instantly returned to its 
former length as soon as the pollen masses were pulled 
out of their sockets. 
The spurs of this orchis are long and narrow and so 
thin in texture that the clear, watery nectar at their tips 
can be easily seen through the tissues of the spur. Their 
length as well as the time of day at which the flowers give 
off their perfume would indicate that they depend, for 
cross-fertilization, upon the evening-flying sphinx moths. 
Pick a bunch of their flowers at almost any hour of the 
day and they seem to have scarcely any odor even when 
held close to the face; but put them in a vase and set 
them away until evening and just as dusk is beginning to 
fall they will fill the room with a perfume so strong and 
sweet as to be almost stifling. 
The greenish-fringed rein orchis should be classed as 
one of our vanishing American wild flowers. So far as I 
have been able to determine, it is to be found only in 
natural meadows of native grasses. The number of such 
places in our Prairie States is year by year becoming less 
and less before the advance of the plow. When the last of 
this native sward has disappeared this inoffensive and 
interesting plant will have gone from our prairies forever. 
Kooskia, Idaho. 
S many of us are aware, the fringed gentian is being 
-■- rapidly exterminated in many localities. In the 
ricinity of towns the large showy flowers rarely go un- 
noticed by even the most unobservant. The wholesale 
gathering of the blossoms in years past has, in many 
cases, been followed by a corresponding wide spread dis- 
FRINGED GENTIAN NOTES. 
BY J. FORD SEMPERS. 
