Stems.—Four to eight inches high. Leaves.—Those from the root narrowly wedge-shaped, those on the stem lance-shaped, opposite. Flowers.—Bright pink, clustered. Calyx.—Five-toothed. Corolla.—Of five petals. Stamens.—Ten. Pistil.—One, with three styles.
PLATE LXIII
TWISTED STALK.—S. roseus.
When a vivid cluster of wild pinks gleams from some rocky opening in the May woods, it is difficult to restrain one’s eagerness, for there is something peculiarly enticing in these fresh, vigorous-looking flowers. They are quite unlike most of their fragile contemporaries, for they seem to be already imbued with the glowing warmth of summer, and to have no memory of that snowy past which appears to leave its imprint on so many blossoms of the early year.
In waste places, from June until September or later, we find the small clustered pink flowers, which open transiently in the sunshine of the sleepy catchfly, S. antirrhina.
Pink Lady’s Slipper. Moccason-flower.
Cypripedium acaule. Orchis Family (p. [17]).
Scape.—Eight to twelve inches high, two-leaved at base, downy, one-flowered. Leaves.—Two, large, many-nerved and plaited, sheathing at the base. Flower.—Solitary, purple-pink. Perianth.—Of three greenish spreading sepals, the two lateral petals narrow, spreading, greenish, the pink lip in the shape of a large inflated pouch. Stamens.—Two, the short filaments each bearing a two-celled anther. Stigma.—Broad, obscurely three-lobed, moist and roughish.
Graceful and tall the slender, drooping stem,
With two broad leaves below,
Shapely the flower so lightly poised between,