The Cuckoo Flower is very common and grows all springtime in every
meadow.
The flowers are a pale purple or lilac. Sometimes you find them almost
white. They have four petals, each of which has a slight nick in the
outer edge. There are six stamens with yellow heads, which you can just
see in the centre of the flower where the petals meet; and you will
notice that two of these stamens are much shorter than the others.
The flowers grow in a cluster near the end of a stout stalk. After the
petals and the small green sepals fall off, the seed-vessel, which is in
the middle of the stamens, shoots up into a long thin pod. This pod is
slightly curved, and is pale brown.
The leaves of the Cuckoo Flower are of two kinds. Those that spring from
the root, close to the ground, grow opposite each other in pairs of
leaflets, on a stalk which has an odd leaflet at the end.
But the leaves which appear further up the main stem are quite different
They, too, grow in opposite pairs, but they are long and narrow like
pointed straps, and are not nearly so pretty as those which are closer
to the ground.