1. M. grandiflòra, Salisb. A small perennial, with the rounded and veiny serrate thin leaves (6–9´´ long) clustered at the ascending apex of creeping subterranean shoots; the 1–2-bracted scape (2–4´ high) bearing a white or rose-colored terminal flower 6´´ wide. (M. uniflora, Gray.)—Deep cold woods, Labrador to Penn., Ind., Minn., and westward. June. (Eu.)
23. PÝROLA, Tourn. Wintergreen. Shin-leaf.
Calyx 5-parted, persistent. Petals 5, concave and more or less converging, deciduous. Stamens 10; filaments awl-shaped, naked; anthers extrorse in the bud, but in the flower inverted by the inflexion of the apex of the filament, more or less 4-celled, opening by a pair of pores at the blunt or somewhat 2-horned base (by inversion the apparent apex). Style generally long; stigma 5-lobed or 5-rayed. Capsule depressed-globose, 5-lobed, 5-celled, 5-valved from the base upward (loculicidal); the valves cobwebby on the edges. Seeds minute, innumerable, resembling sawdust, with a very loose cellular-reticulated coat.—Low and smooth perennial herbs, with running subterranean shoots, bearing a cluster of rounded petioled evergreen root-leaves, and a simple raceme of nodding flowers, on an upright more or less scaly-bracted scape. (Name a diminutive of Pyrus, the Pear-tree, from some fancied resemblance in the foliage.)
[*] Style straight, much narrower than the peltate 5-rayed stigma, petals and stamens erect and connivent; anthers not narrowed below the openings.
1. P. mìnor, L. Scape 5–10´ high; leaves roundish, slightly crenulate, thickish, mostly longer than the margined petiole; flowers small, crowded, white or rose-color; calyx-lobes triangular-ovate, very much shorter than the nearly globose corolla; style short and included.—Cold woods, Lab., White Mts., L. Superior, and northward.
2. P. secúnda, L. Subcaulescent, 3–6´ high; leaves ovate, thin, longer than the petiole, scattered, finely serrate; racemes dense and spike-like, the numerous small (greenish-white) flowers all turned to one side, scarcely nodding; calyx-lobes ovate, very much shorter than the oblong-oval petals; style long, exserted.—Rich woods, Lab. to Minn., south to Md., and far northward. July. (Eu.)
Var. pùmila, Gray, is a smaller form, with rounded leaves 6´´ or little more in diameter, and 3–8-flowered scape.—High peat-bogs, N. Y. to L. Superior, and northward. July, Aug.
[*][*] Style strongly declined, the apex curved upward, longer than the connivent or spreading petals; stigma much narrower than the truncate excavated ring-like apex of the style; anthers contracted below the openings, forming a short neck; leaves denticulate or entire.
[+] Petals and leaves acute, the latter ovate, coriaceous.
3. P. oxypétala, C. F. Austin. Leaves ovate, small (8–12´´ long), shorter than the slender petiole; scape (7–8´ high) several-flowered; flowers on ascending pedicels, not nodding; calyx-lobes triangular-ovate, acute, short; petals lanceolate-oblong, acuminate, greenish; anthers conspicuously mucronate at the apex, obtusely 2-horned at base, not inverted; style straightish, scarcely exserted.—Wooded hill near Deposit, Delaware Co., N. Y. (C. F. Austin, in 1860). Not since found; probably monstrous.