Perennial, aquatic herb found in shallow ponds, standing water, and swamps, preferably those accessible to tidewater. New England to the Gulf States, mostly near the coast. Not in Ohio. April, May.

Rootstock

Thick, fleshy.

Leaves

All from the root, long-petioled, oblong-elliptic, nerved without distinct midvein, dull green above, pale underneath, five to twelve inches long, narrowed or partly furled at the base, floating or erect.

Scape

Six to twenty inches tall, slender, terete, flattened just below the flowering club, closely covered by a short sheath at base.

Flowers

Minute, bright yellow, perfect, crowded on a spadix one to two inches long, which becomes greatly thickened in fruit; the lower flowers with six concave sepals and six stamens, the upper ones with four; odor unpleasant.

Calyx

Four to six scale-like, yellow sepals.

Corolla

Wanting.

Stamens

Four to six, with linear filaments and small anthers.

Pistil

Ovary partly imbedded in the spadix, one-celled; stigma sessile.

Fruit

A single seed, surrounded by a loose, green cover; the whole called a utricle.

Golden-Club. Oronlium aquaticum

The Golden-Club, found in shallow water, is blood brother both to the Skunk-Cabbage and to Jack-in-the-Pulpit, but its habitat is not so extended as theirs. It dwells in New England and southward along the coast. So far as I know, it rarely crosses the Alle-ghanies and is not found in the Middle West.

The enclosing and protecting spathe, which is a marked characteristic of the Arums, in the Golden-Club has virtually disappeared, becoming a mere leaflet on the flower-stem. The summit of the flower-stem becomes a golden-yellow spadix, crowded with tiny blossoms each with six sepals, six golden stamens, and a pistil. The long-petioled, oblong leaves mostly float, though sometimes they stand erect.