Part 8

The Stinking Iris, Gladdon, or Roast-beef plant (_Iris fœtidissima_), with purple sepals, yellow petals and stigmas. Flowers not quite so large as the last. Woods and copses. May to July.

=Marsh Orchis= (_Orchis latifolia_).

There are nearly forty British species of Orchideæ, divided into sixteen genera; and in the space at our disposal it is impossible to give anything like an adequate account of the group or of the specific characters. An attempt will be made, however, to make the reader acquainted with the general structure by means of three figures. The first of these represents the Marsh Orchis (_O. latifolia_), a species commonly to be met in wet meadows and marshy places, flowering from May to July. The two tubers are _palmate_, that is, more or less flattened like a hand, and terminating in finger-like processes. The leaves chiefly spring from the summit of one of these tubers, the lowest acting as sheath for the next, and so on, the tubular flower-stem rising through all the sheaths. The leaves are oblong, and spotted with purple. The inflorescence is a spike, the flowers crowded upon it, but separated by the long three-nerved green bracts. The structure of these flowers will be found to differ widely from all we have considered in these pages. The perianth is placed above the (consequently _inferior_) ovary, which is twisted. This twist, it will be well to bear in mind, brings the flower “upside down.” The three sepals and the three petals are equally coloured, and it is therefore convenient to speak of them as the perianth. There is only one stamen, which is supported by the pistil. Two of the perianth leaves combine to form a hood over the stamen, and a third is greatly larger than the others, divided into three lobes and hanging down like the lip of a labiate flower. This is known as the _labellum_, and it is continued backwards and downwards as a hollow spur, in which, however, honey is not secreted. At the top of this spur, at the back, is the stigmatic surface, and above it protrudes a fleshy knob, called the _rostellum_, which supports the anther. This organ consists of two lobes, side by side, which open in front, and reveal in each a mass of pollen grains tied together by elastic threads and attached to a slender foot-stalk with a sticky base. This is a tedious description, though we have made it as brief as possible. The reader shall see the reason for it if he will conduct a little experiment. We may premise that these orchids are fertilized by long-tongued insects, who suck the juice through the tender skin lining the spur.

Now for the experiment. Take a finely-pointed pencil, which we will pretend is the head and tongue of a humble-bee in search of this sweet juice. We push the point gently down the spur, when a part of the pencil touches against the rostellum and presses it down, touches lightly the viscid feet of the pollen masses (_pollinia_), and as the pencil is withdrawn both come with it, and stick out from it like a pair of horns. Be careful to hold the pencil in the exact position it now occupies, and watch. The heavy heads of the pollinia are drooping forward, but after a few minutes they cease to fall lower. Now push the pencil into this other flower. _The pollen-masses go directly to the stigma, and some of the pollen is detached._ If you are watching where orchids grow it is no uncommon thing to see insects flying around with these pollinia attached to their heads or tongues like a pair of horns.

It will be seen to be impossible for the pollen to fall upon the stigma of the same flower, and from its elastic attachments it is impossible that it should be carried by the wind to another flower, so that insect agency is here an absolute necessity.

=The Butterfly Orchis= (_Habenaria bifolia_).

This species is very similar in structure and habit to the Marsh Orchis, but the tubers are more cylindrical in shape, the radical leaves almost always restricted to two, the flower-spike lax. Flowers white with a greenish tinge, the labellum and spur very long: fragrant. The stigma two-lobed. Fertilized by moths. Occurs in meadows, hill-sides and woods, flowering from June to August.

=The Bee Orchis= (_Ophrys apifera_).

In the genus _Ophrys_ we have three species whose flowers bear quite startling likeness to a bee, spider and fly respectively. What is the purpose of this counterfeit presentment it is difficult to conjecture. It has been suggested that it might be to warn off or deceive insects, as the flowers are self-fertilized, but Charles Darwin did not think this was the probable reason. There is no spur in this group, there is no rostellum, and the ovary is not twisted. The stalks (_caudicles_) of the pollinia are so long and thin that the weight of the pollen masses causes them to bend over and touch against the stigma, fertilizing it.

I. Bee Orchis (_O. apifera_). The labellum is very convex and broad, three-lobed, of a rich velvety-brown colour, with a tail. The sepals are pinkish. The spike has only about half a dozen flowers upon it, with a large leafy bract under each. Hillsides, fields and copses on chalk and limestone, chiefly in the South of England and Ireland. June and July. (_Plate 77._)

II. Spider Orchis (_O. aranifera_). Similar to the last, but the sepals greenish, labellum differently marked, and without a tail. Similar situations to _apifera_, but much more rare. April and May.

III. Fly Orchis (_O. muscifera_). Sepals greenish, labellum narrow, flat, brown, with a yellow-edged, squarish blue patch. Strikingly like a fly. May to July.

The name of the genus is from the Greek, _ophrus_, an eyebrow, said to refer to the markings on the labellum.

Several other British species in different genera from those named bear similarly strange likenesses, such as the extremely rare Lizard Orchis (_Orchis hircina_), but some of the foreign forms are more remarkable still.

In addition to the species figured and those briefly described, we would call attention to a few others that may come under the rambler’s notice. In boggy ground and sphagnum beds he may be so fortunate as to find the rare Bog Orchis (_Malaxis paludosa_), a small plant with tiny yellow-green flowers (July to September), and the scanty leaves producing bulbils from their edges which grow into new plants. In similar situations in the eastern counties he may even find the larger but much rarer Fen Orchis (_Liparis loeselii_).

A singular species, to be found chiefly in beechwoods throughout the country, is the Birds’-nest Orchis (_Neottia nidus-avis_), so called from the peculiar character of its roots, which are stout and juicy, and woven into a resemblance to a nest. The whole plant is of a pretty uniform brown tint--both stem and flowers. There are no leaves, for the plant lives upon decaying vegetable matter, and has no necessity to bother about chlorophyll. It is botanically known as a saprophyte. Flowers June and July.

The very distinct Twayblade (_Listera ovata_) is sure to be encountered in woods and pastures. Its two leaves are very broad, and appear to be opposite, but are not really so. The flowers are small and greenish; they appear in May. There is a singular fact in connection with the fertilization of this plant that should be noted. The pollen-masses are dry and friable, and would not be likely to adhere to insects. But if the rostellum be touched ever so lightly, it instantly exudes a gummy fluid, which enables the pollen to stick tightly to the insect causing the irritation. Examine the flower with your lens, irritate the rostellum by prodding it with the point of a hair from your own head, and note what you observe.

At the end of Summer in dry pastures there may be found a slender plant with a twisted spike of fragrant white flowers. These flowers are very small, enclosed each in a hood-like bract. It is the Autumnal Lady’s-tresses (_Spiranthes autumnalis_). The rosette of leaves from the root does not appear until after the flowers.

=Hairbell or Blue-bell= (_Campanula rotundifolia_).

This is the true Blue-bell of Scotland. As we have indicated (page 14), the Blue-bell of the Southron is the Wild Hyacinth. Scotsmen are very sensitive upon the point of the Hyacinth having so dear a name bestowed upon it, when it has already a sufficiently good and classical one, and there are few, if any, more certain ways of rousing a Scot than by exhibiting _Scilla_ as the _true_ Blue-bell, or by describing _Campanula_ as the Hairbell. Others have found the plant a fruitful source of controversy on a philological point--should it be spelled Hairbell or Harebell?--does its name refer to the slender hair-like stems, or to its habit of growing where hares delight to revel? As against Hairbell, which is descriptive of the plant, Harebell has no chance of retention among botanists, whatever philologists may say.

There are six species of _Campanula_ included in the British flora, of which two are rare, and one of these is probably only an escape from cultivation. _The_ characteristic of them all is a beautiful bell-shaped corolla with five lobes, five stamens, and the style with three to five stigmas. They are mostly perennial, and the flowers most frequently blue. _C. rotundifolia_ has a creeping rootstock, and several slender-angled stems. The first formed leaves, near the ground, are more or less rotund in shape, and stalked, but as they occur higher up the stem they are more and more linear. The flowers are nodding or drooping, and swayed by the breeze. Heaths and pastures. July to September.

The Nettle-leaved Bell-flower (_C. trachelium_) is an erect tall-stemmed (3 feet or more) hairy species, with leaves like nettles, with large purple flowers in a terminal panicle. Woody lanes and copses. August to October.

=The Centaury= (_Erythræa centaurium_).

A very neat and beautiful plant, not nearly so well-known as it should be. It is an annual plant, with erect stem, less than a foot in height, the leaves in pairs growing together at their bases, and funnel-shaped pink flowers produced in terminal cymes. It grows in woods and sandy or chalky pastures, flowering from June till September.

The name is from the Greek, _Eruthros_, red, in allusion to the pink flowers.

=Wild Mignonette= (_Reseda lutea_), and

=Weld or Dyer’s-weed= (_Reseda luteola_).

So familiar is the Sweet Mignonette of our gardens, and so like and yet unlike are these wild species, that whilst no one would take them for the garden plant one need not be a botanist to see their natural affinities at a glance. Like their garden relative these are annual herbs, becoming biennial when we have mild winters; with flowers that are individually inconspicuous, but which gain sufficient prominence by being associated in racemes. In colour they are a yellow-green. The calyx is irregular, and divided into from four to seven narrow segments; there is a similar number of unequal petals, each deeply cleft into two lobes, and a multitude of stamens. The stigmas are lobes at the mouth of the open ovary.

I. Wild Mignonette (_R. lutea_) grows in dry waste places, especially in chalky districts. Its leaves vary a great deal, but are either pinnate or deeply lobed in a somewhat irregular manner. Flowers, pale-yellow in a tolerably dense raceme. Very similar to the Sweet Mignonette, but stiffer, more erect, and scentless. Flowers June to September.

II. Weld (_R. luteola_). This is a much taller plant than _R. lutea_, with longer racemes and denser; the flowers more green than yellow, and with undivided glossy leaves. Petals, three, four, or five. In the days before aniline colours this plant was much used by dyers, and cultivated for their purposes. It yields a beautiful yellow dye, and its juice is also used in the preparation of the artist’s colour called Dutch pink. It is a common wayside plant in England and in Ireland, more rare in Scotland, and flowers from June to September.

The name is from the Latin, _Resedo_, to appease, from these plants being formerly considered as sedatives.

=Borage= (_Borago officinalis_).

This is a plant one may find on rubbish heaps and waste ground anywhere near the habitations of man, for it is not, strictly speaking, a native, though thoroughly well-established here. An old adage runs: “I, Borage, always bring courage,” and it was supposed to brace up the heart for great enterprises. It was therefore widely cultivated in old gardens, and has survived to this day in the grounds of old houses, where it has frequently made its escape, or surplus plants have been thrown out upon the rubbish heaps. Instead of allowing itself to go the way of garden refuse, it has taken hold of the ground there, multiplied and brightened the place with its beauty.

Every part of the plant, except the corolla, bristles with short stiff hairs. It has an erect juicy stem, and rough, lance-shaped leaves, the radical ones on long footstalks, those on the stem stalkless and clasping their support. The sepals are five in number, long and narrow, cohering by their bases. The corolla is of the form technically known as _rotate_, that is, with the petals joined at their lower parts to a short tube, from the top of which five pointed lobes radiate. It is coloured a most brilliant and beautiful blue, such as is rarely seen in flowers. There is a pale yellow ovary that secretes honey, and around it, attached to the throat of the corolla-tube, are the five united stamens. The anthers are dark purple, and open in such manner that the pollen falls between them and the pistil, somewhat as in _Viola_. By this arrangement both honey and pollen are protected from the depredations of insects who have no right to it. Bees, however, in forcing their tongues down to the honeyed ovary, separate the anthers and let loose the pollen, which falls upon their heads and will be brought into contact with the stigma of another flower at their next visit. Cross-fertilization is further helped by the stigmas of a flower not becoming ripe until its anthers have shed their pollen. Flowers June and July.

Name probably from the Latin _Bourra_, a flock of wool, in allusion to its hairy character.

=Oblong Pond-weed= (_Potamogeton polygonifolius_).

We have pond-weeds in abundance, but the Potamogetons are the pond-weeds _par excellence_. There is scarcely a piece of water in this country, be it river, lake, pond, canal, or intermittently dry ditch, but has one or more species growing there. The genus is a very difficult one, such as it is impossible to do more than show the general characters of here. Hooker and Bennett, in their revision of the genus, give twenty-one British species with a number of connecting sub-species and varieties. The one figured here is the Oblong Pond-weed (_P. polygonifolius_), with narrowly egg-shaped floating leaves, and narrower submerged leaves. All have long leaf-stalks. The floating leaves always present the upper side to the air, and are always perfectly dry. The flowers are greenish and unattractive, collected into a slender spike. Individually they consist of a four-parted perianth, four stamens, four carpels. There is a species (_P. natans_) with broader floating leaves and narrow submerged leaves. A broader still is _P. plantagineus_, with clearer leaves and more slender leaf-stalks. _P. crispus_, _P. densus_, _P. perfoliatus_, _P. prælongus_, etc., have only submerged leaves, which are more or less oblong.

The species with floating leaves form refuges for many interesting low forms of life, and the microscopist will find them very fruitful in specimens for him.

The name is from the Greek words, _potamos_, a river, and _geiton_, a neighbour.

=Traveller’s Joy= (_Clematis vitalba_).

When rambling, in chalky districts especially, our readers will meet this climbing shrub at every turn, scrambling over all the hedges, flinging its arms out over the way, and clinging persistently to any branch or shoot it touches. It has a variety of names, some of which may be applied at different seasons by persons who think they are speaking of different plants. In the early summer it may be the White Vine, or the Virgin’s Bower; in autumn, when the feathery awns are lengthening on its seed-vessels, it may fitly be called the Old Man’s Beard, and when winter has cleared most things away from the hedges, but left these gleaming feathers in abundance, it may give the Traveller Joy to see them as he passes.

It is a perennial plant, with a tough stem, climbing by means of its leaf-stalks, which curl round any likely support, and become hard as wire. The leaves are opposite and compound, the leaflets usually five, the stalks of these also acting as tendrils. The flower has no corolla, but the four thick sepals are coloured greenish-white to serve instead. The stamens are a crowd round the central cluster of many-bearded styles, which afterwards elongate and become the “old men’s beards.” The flowers, which are slightly fragrant, may be found from July to September.

The Traveller’s Joy is peculiarly English, so far as its distribution in the United Kingdom is concerned. It is found only to the south of Denbigh and Stafford. This, too, is the only British member of the genus; but a very large number of foreign species are cultivated in our gardens, where they are quite hardy.

The name is from the Greek _Klema_, a vine-twig.

=The Self-Heal= (_Brunella vulgaris_).

A perennial herb of the wayside and the damp pasture, that has fallen upon evil days, so far as reputation is concerned. Time was when it was considered one of the most useful medicines for inward and outward wounds. Culpepper says “he needeth neither physician nor surgeon that hath Self-heal and Sanicle to help himself,” and he prints that sentence in italics, to impress it more firmly upon his readers. On this account it was called Carpenter’s Herb, Hook-heal, Sickle-wort, and Prunella. The last is a softened form of Brunella, from the German _Bräune_ (quinsy), because it was believed to cure that complaint. Its reputation has passed, but the names remain, and one has been adopted as its scientific appellation.

There is a suggestion of the Bugle in its general appearance, but seen together (_see_ page 21) there is no danger of mistaking them. In _Ajuga_ the whorls are far apart, in _Brunella_ they are contracted into a dense head. The corolla here is broader, the upper lip erect and vaulted, whilst in _Ajuga_ it is short and notched.

The plant has the square stem, lipped flowers, and four stamens, characteristic of the Labiate order, a creeping rootstock, and stalked leaves; these are long, oval, toothed, or with entire margins. The bracts of the flower-spike have purple edges. Leaves and stem more or less hairy; flowers purple, sometimes white or crimson. July to September. Occasionally small flowers are produced later, in which the anthers are suppressed, but the pistil is perfect.

This is the only British member of the genus, whose name has been explained above.

=Goat’s Beard= (_Tragopogon pratensis_).

One of the folk-names of this plant is “John-go-to-bed-at-Noon,” and I think it is the only example of a British plant name that is a sentence of six words. “Three-faces-under-a-hood” runs it pretty closely, but the few names we have of this order do not usually exceed four words; such as Queen-of-the-Meadows, Jack-by-the-hedge, and Poor-man’s-weatherglass. John-go-to-bed, etc., is a nice expressive name, and is due to the fact that the flower is an early-closer with a vengeance. It is probably the originator of the eight-hours day, for it opens at four in the morning and closes by twelve. Farmers’ boys were said of old to consult its flowers with reference to dinner-time, but probably in these days of machine-made watches the practice is obsolete.

Goat’s-beard has a tap-root, somewhat like a parsnip, and long curling grass-like, stalkless leaves that clasp the stem by their bases. The flower-heads are solitary, yellow, and the eight involucral bracts are united at the base. All the florets (like those of Dandelion, Sowthistle and Chicory) are rayed, and contain both stamens and pistil. They are invested with pappus hairs (_see_ page 20), which are stiff and feathered. It is from these beards the plant gets its English name, which is reproduced in the Greek words from which the name of the genus is composed, _tragos_, a goat, and _pogon_, a beard. It flowers during June and July, and is fairly common in meadows and wastes in England; much more rarely in Scotland and Ireland.

There is an introduced species with larger purple or rose-coloured flowers, found occasionally in damp meadows. This is the Salsify (_Tragopogon porrifolius_). It is occasionally grown for the sake of its roots, which have a medicinal value, but inferior to those of Scorzonera, which it somewhat resembles.

=Wild Thyme= (_Thymus serpyllum_).

The Wild Thyme grows on the hills and the high heath lands, usually among fine grasses that are close-cropped by sheep and rabbits; or if on lower ground it will probably be found upon the light and well-drained soil of a mole-hill among mosses. In spite of its diminutive stature it is a shrub, with a woody rootstock and a creeping stem, from which arise the flowering stems. The leaves, which are very small and stalked, are egg-shaped, with even margins, often turned under. The rosy-purple flowers are produced in spikes. They are of the usual _labiate_ type, and both the calyx and the corolla are two-lipped. The upper lip of the calyx is three-toothed, the lower cleft in two, the whole of a purplish hue. The upper lip of the corolla is straight and notched, the lower cut into three lobes. There are two forms of flower--smaller and larger; the small are perfect, the larger bearing developed anthers only. It should be noted also that in the complete flowers the anthers shed their pollen before the stigmas are ripe; self-fertilization is therefore impossible. The flower produces much honey, the whole plant is highly fragrant, and in consequence is very much visited by insects who carry the pollen. While the stamens are ripe the pistil is short and almost hidden within the corolla-tube; when the pollen has been shed the style elongates, the two arms of the stigma diverge and occupy a prominent position far outside the lips. Under this arrangement insects alighting on the younger flowers dust themselves with pollen, and upon visiting those a day or two older could scarcely fail to deposit some of it upon the ripe stigmas.

This is the only native species of a genus named from the ancient Greek name for the plant.

=Mercury Goosefoot= (_Chenopodium bonus-henricus_).