"If you desire a flower to pick and use for bouquets, then the wild
geranium is not your flower. It droops very quickly after picking and
almost immediately drops its petals. But the purplish flowers are showy,
and the leaves, while rather coarse, are deeply cut. This latter effect
gives a certain boldness to the plant that is rather attractive. The
plant is found in rather moist, partly shaded portions of the woods. I
like this plant in the garden. It adds good colour and permanent colour
as long as blooming time lasts, since there is no object in picking it.

"I suppose little children would not have a perfect spring without the
dog's tooth violet. The leaves are attractive and almost make the beauty
of a bouquet. It is sometimes called trout lily. The mottled effect of
the leaves accounts for the trout part of the name, and as for lily, it
_is_ a lily, and never belonged to the violet family at all. Dig the
plant up, and the bulbous root tells the story. It really does belong to
the lily family. The nodding yellow flower is pretty, too. These, when
picked, last a long time in water. They like to grow in the
neighbourhood of the brook. A moist, half-shaded half-open piece of land
is their delight, and therefore in many gardens the trout lily might
have to be left out.

"There is a sweet little flower called the wood anemone, or wind-flower.
It is another modest little flower, white in colour. The constant
nodding of the petals stirred by even a breath of wind gives it the name
of wind-flower. These also grow in colonies. Have you noticed how
social, but clannish, our wild flowers are? Especially is this true of
the real woods flowers, rather than of the wayside flowers. The anemone
grows in open places by the woods or the hillside. They are a sort of
border plant evidently trying to leave the woods, but still bound to it.