ORGANOTOPIC PRANTS. 
89 
been lumped with the parasites, and the status of hemisap- 
rophytes is as yet ill defined. The former are supposed to 
live entirely, the latter partially “upon the debris of the 
vegetable world, deriving their nourishment from the or¬ 
ganic matter resulting from its decay.” Of course, the 
mushrooms are the typical saprophytes. They make no 
pretence of being anything else. The flowering sapro¬ 
phytes are not quite so honest. The only ones we are like¬ 
ly to see in this region are the coral-roots, if, indeed, they 
prove to be wholly saprophytic, a point which is not as yet 
definitely established. At any rate, these queer orchids 
come the nearest to being saprophytes of any of our local 
flowering plants. While their flowers continue to attain 
the high degree of specialization in the interest of cross¬ 
fertilization which characterizes the orchid family, the as¬ 
pect of the plants is precisely that of root parasites. The 
plants are brownish or yellowish, sometimes tinged with 
purple; the leaves are mere scales and there are no breath¬ 
ing pores. Consequently ‘ ‘they are unable to elaborate the 
constituents needed for nutriment or to change carbonic 
acid from the air into assimilated food material.” Then 
why not call them parasites? Simply because investiga¬ 
tion has proved that they are independent of other plants, 
there being no organic connection between them and any 
living plants which might serve as hosts. We have three, 
possibfy four, species of coral-root, (Corallorhiza.) I have 
collected in Manchester C. innata, odontorhiza and multi¬ 
flora. The last named is abundant in rich, dry woods from 
July to September; of the second I have found but a single 
plant; the first grows in wet runs in woods, often partly 
immersed, and is the earliest of the genus, in dry seasons 
flowering as soon as the first of May, in wet seasons not de¬ 
veloping until much later, sometimes not until well into 
June. C. innata has yellow stems with no trace of purple 
and the flowers have the sepals and petals yellowish and 
