210 
ORDER MONOGYN1A. 
considered a species of the same genus as the whortleberry, as it 
has but eight stamens, is removed into the eighth class. Among 
the different species of the whortleberry is one with blue ber- 
ries, another with very black berries, and the bilberry, which is 
a large shrub from five to eight feet high. 
A great proportion of the plants in the first order of the tenth 
class are to be found in shady woods in June and July. We 
can here enumerate but few of them ; in the description of the 
genera of plants which we have provided, you will be able to 
find the most common ones. 
We will not, however omit to mention the Monotropa, a most 
curious little plant ; several stems of a few inches in height, 
usually grow up in a cluster, each stem supporting a single 
flower, which, in form, resembles a tobacco pipe. The stems 
have scales upon them but no leaves : the whole plant is per- 
fectly white and looks as if made of wax ; it is sometimes 
called Indian pipe. You must look for this in shady woods 
near the roots of old trees, in June or the first of July. 
Rhododendron, or as it is sometimes called the mountain lau- 
rel or rose bay, is an evergreen with large and beautiful oval 
leaves, found growing on the sides of mountains, or in wet 
swamps of cedar; it flourishes beneath the shade of the trees; 
the pink and white flowers appear in large showy clusters and 
continue in bloom for a long period ; they have a 5 toothed 
calyx, a 5 cleft funnel-form, somewhat irregular corolla, stamens 
10, sometimes half the number, capsule 5 celled, 5 valved. 
Connected by natural relations to the rose bay or Rhododen- 
dron is the American laurel, (Kalmia,) a splendid shrub, some- 
times found ten or thirteen feet high. On the Catskill moun- 
tains, it is said to have been seen twenty feet in height ; the 
flowers grow in that kind of cluster called a corymb ; they are 
either white or red. but this fair and beautiful shrub is of a 
poisonous nature, particularly fatal to sheep who are attracted 
towards it ; one species of the Kalmia is on this account called 
sheep laurel. 
Among the plants which have a place in this part of the ar- 
tificial system, is the Dionjea muscipida, or Venus’ fly trap. 
This is a native of North Carolina; the leaves spring from the 
roots, each leaf has at its extremity a kind of appendage, like a 
small leaf doubled ; this is bordered on its edges by glands, re- 
sembling little hairs, containing a liquid that attracts insects ; 
but no sooner does the unfortunate insect alight upon the leaf, 
than with a sudden spring, it closes itself, and the little prisoner 
is crushed to death in the midst of the sweets it had imprudent- 
Monotropa or Indian pipe — Mountain Laurel — Kalmia or sheep laurel. 
