Dactylis and the Phleum are widely cultivated and are, for us, three of the most valuable members of this great family, excepting the cereals. The Glyceria and the Alopecurus, of differing habit and habitat, are wild forms which hover on the borders of cultivation but are not of it.

The two clovers and the lupine are gregarious plants and sometimes tinge whole fields with their own. color. In the meadows the clovers may usurp the place of the grasses and yet they are not considered intruders; rather they are sought and cultivated as two of the most valuable fodder plants. Other plants of the same order, the Leguminosa, are attracting attention for the same reason. Desmodiums, Lespedezas and Medicagos, especially the alfalfa (Medicago sativa, L.) are now much cultivated, and with profit, in various sections of this country.

Here are four species of orchids, belonging to four different genera, and they are among the most interesting of their kind. The lady's slipper and the Arethusa will always attract by their color, and yet the greenish flowers of the Pogonia and the Habenaria exhibit as exquisite adaptations for the securing of cross-fertilization as any of the order. Once a year, at least, I want to lift the lid-like anther of the Arethusa and the Pogonia to see if the pollen-masses are yet retained in their snug case, and to touch the button-shaped disk of the pollen

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mass of the Habenaria and so draw out the entire contents of the anther-cell, as a sphinx moth would probably do if I did not anticipate it. Since the publication of Darwin's "On the Various Contrivances by which Orchids are fertilized by Insects," in 1862, there have been many additions to our knowledge of this subject, but his work stands out preeminent, and as fascinating as a fairy tale. As a reasonably active imagination is necessary for the full enjoyment of the latter, so a little previous knowledge of the subject is wonderfully helpful to our proper appreciation of the former. I read the book after I had become acquainted with many of the local orchids and was delighted with it. imagine that the result might have been different if I had read the book first.

I can

On looking in some of my old diaries I see that I have found the Pogonia verticillata as early as May 21st, and the Cypripedium parviflorum as early as May 22d; Year after year I found but the present season is late. them in Heywood's woods. And not these only; for here is a Luna moth just out of its cocoon, its wings not yet dry; and there runs, close to the ground, a bright olive-green bird which is easily identified as the goldencrowned thrush or oven-bird. A short search reveals a little mound of dead leaves, within which is a nest with What a solithree brown-dotted cream-colored eggs. tary place the little oven-bird has chosen for its nest!

Let us hope it may escape the prowlers which infest the woodland. John Burroughs in "Wake Robin" was the first writer to describe to me its songs, but I am not yet certain that I have heard but one.

One of the humble plants, which must find its way into any list of New England plants, is an emigrant hither from the Old World. The common yarrow, however, has an illustrious name (Achillea Millefolium). Its connection with the swift-footed Achilles of the Trojan war is certainly mythical, but it pleasantly reminds us that Achilles was a pupil of Chiron, the wisest and justest of all the Centaurs, and skilled in the art of healing.* Under a simple microscope its small heads of flowers form objects of great beauty. Several years ago, on a long, hot climb up Mount Washington by the bridle-path from the Crawford House, I was interested to notice the dwarfing of the vegetation as we ascended the mountain-side, and when we reached the long ridge which slopes away up to the topmost peak, and saw all around only dwarf birches and willows, lichens and mosses, we realized we were in the sub-arctic zone of vegetation as truly as if we were two thousand miles further northward. But at the very summit, a vigorous plant of Achillea was in bloom, undaunted as its namesake in the midst of dangers that

* See Landor's Imaginary Conversations, Vol. I., Achilles and Helena.