YELLOW LADY’S SLIPPERS. Cypripedium parviflorum and Cypripedium pubescens.

“And golden slippers meet for Fairies’ feet.”

HIS ornamental family are remarkable alike for the singular beauty of their flowers, and the peculiar arrangement of the internal organs. In the Linnæan classification they were included in common, with all the Orchis tribe, in the class Gynandria, but in the Natural Order of Jussieu, which we have followed, the “Lady’s Slipper” (Cypripedium), forms one of the sub-orders in the general Order Orchidaceæ.

Of the two species represented in our Artist’s group, the larger and central flower is Cypripedium pubescens, the smaller, C. parviflorum, or Lesser Lady’s Slipper. The latter is, perhaps, the more elegant and graceful plant, and is also somewhat fragrant. The sepals and petals are longer and more spiral, but the colouring of the lip is not so rich and vivid as in the larger flower, C. pubescens.

The small flowered plant affects a moist soil, such as low wet meadows and open swampy woods; while the larger species, better known by its more familiar name Moccasin flower, loves the open woodlands and drier plains; where, in the month of June, it may be seen beside the gay Painted Cup (Castilleia coccinea), the Blue Lupine (L. perennis), the larger White Trillium, and other lovely wild flowers, forming a charming contrast to their various colours and no less varied forms.

The stem of the larger Moccasin flower is thick and leafy, each bright green, many-nerved leaf sheathing the flowers before they open. The flowers are from one to three in number; bent forward; drooping gracefully downwards. The golden sac-like lip is elegantly striped and spotted with ruby red; the twisted narrow petals, and sepals, two in number of each kind, are of a pale fawn colour, sometimes veined and lined with a deeper shade. Like many others of the genus, the organs of the flower assume a singular and grotesque resemblance to the face of some animal. On lifting up the fleshy petal-like middle lobe which protects the stamens and pistil, the face of an Indian hound may be imagined; the stamens, which are two in number, situated one on either side of the sterile depressed central lobe, when the flower is mature, turn of a deep brown, and resemble two round eyes; the blunt stigma takes the form of the nose, while the sepals look like ears. There is something positively comical in the appearance of the ape-like face of C. spectabile, the beautiful showy Lady’s Slipper, the description of which will be found to face the plate in which it forms a prominent feature.

The most beautiful of all the species is the “Stemless Lady’s Slipper,” Cypripedium acaule, of which we will treat at some future time. It bears removal to the garden if planted in a suitable situation; but all these native flowers require attention to their peculiar habits and soil, or they will disappoint the expectation of the cultivator and end in failure. All wild flowers transplanted from the woods require shade, and bog plants both moisture and shade.

Nat. Ord. Iridaceæ.