Flowers of Mystery 457 
own responsive thrill, just as we do in a good ghost 
story. 
Many wild flowers which we have transplanted to 
our gardens are full of magic and charm. In some, 
such as Thyme and Elder, these elements come 
from English tradition. In other flowers the quality 
of mystery is inherent. In childhood I absolutely 
abhorred Bloodroot ; it seemed to me a fearsome 
thing when first I picked it. I remember well my 
dismay, it was so pure, so sleek, so innocent of 
face, yet bleeding at a touch, like a murdered man 
in the Blood Ordeal. 
The Trillium, Wake-robin, is a wonderful flower. 
I have seen it growing in a luxuriance almost beyond 
belief in lonely Canadian forests on the Laurentian 
Mountains. At this mining settlement, so remote 
that it was unvisited even by the omnipresent and 
faithful Canadian priest, was a wealth of plant growth 
which seemed fairly tropical. The starry flowers of 
the Trillium hung on long peduncles, and the two- 
inch diameter of the ordinary blossom was doubled. 
The Painted Trillium bore rich flowers of pink and 
wine color, and stood four or five feet from the 
ground. I think no one had ever gathered their 
blooms, for there were no women in this mining 
camp save a few French-Indian servants and one 
Irish cook, and no educated white woman had ever 
been within fifty, perhaps a hundred, miles of the 
place. Every variety of bloom seemed of exagger- 
ated growth, but the Trillium exceeded all. An 
element of mystery surrounds this plant, a quality 
which appertains to all “ three-cornered ” flowers ; 
