[Illustration: =The Pink Moccasin-Flower.= (_Cypripedium acaule._) This is the only two-leaved _Cypripedium_ found in the Atlantic region. It is closely allied with _Cypripedium guttatum_ of Alaska and with _Cypripedium fasciculatum_ of the Pacific slope. It is the most common species of this genus.] There is hardly a child in the first grade in our schools who cannot tell the story of the bee and the Moccasin-Flower, and why the wonderful lines and dots of pink and gold are inside the downy shoe, instead of making the outside the more showy. The first Moccasin-Flower which I found in Aurora’s Bog in North Adams I gave to Ray, a little lad of my acquaintance, and he happily and proudly carried it to his teacher. When he came home, he could tell me that all these inner decorations of pink and gold were dewy-tipped with sweets, and were called “Honey Guides,” just to invite bees within. And that although Master Bee goes through the front door of the Moccasin cottage, he somehow finds it locked when he wishes to escape, so in his excitement has to squeeze through the small back door next to the pollen-masses. He carries forth some of the pollen, and thus helps to fertilize the next blossom of this species, as he enters and rubs off the grains of pollen on the adhesive lobes of the viscid stigma. Insects thus are not permitted to rob the flowers of nectar and pollen without making a return for the food which the flower yields them. Were it not for the bees and moths and various flies, the seeds of orchids would not mature, for it is a generally accepted fact that nearly all species of this family, wherever found growing, depend upon insect aid for fertilization and cross-fertilization. With the exception of one or two North American species of genus _Habenaria_, all other native species are aided by insects. These two species, _Habenaria hyperborea_ and _Habenaria clavellata_, were, according to both Gray and Darwin, supposed regularly to fertilize themselves without aid of insects. As the spikes of the Tall Green Orchis (_Habenaria hyperborea_) are frequent in the Pownal swamps, in company with the Showy Lady’s Slipper, I became interested in this plant, so independent of Master Bee or Moth.