WINTERGREEN, a name applied to sev eral ericaccous plants which retain their foliage uver winter. In eastern North America, the aromatic little Gonitheria grocunsbens (see Gammon/0 is generally the plant referred to by this name. It is a low shrub, barely six inches high, found in rocky woods, with creep ing stems, half hidden, from which arise erect. reddish branches, bearing ovate glossy leathery leaves. These are serrate with bristly tipped teeth and are gathered in a tuft at the top of the slender stalk, the fleshy, white or pinkish, urn-shaped flowers nodding underneath. The fruits are bright scarlet, mealy, and, spicy in flavor; and are really enlarged fleshy calyces which have enclosed the seed-capsules and as sumed the form of a berry. They are some times called checker-berries, and remain throughout the winter. The whole plant is aromatic in taste, and is frequently eaten, foli age, berries and all. The spiciness is due to the volatile oil of Gaultheria (q.v.) which is a
stimulant, astringent and diuretic drug, but is chiefly used for flavoring, confectionery or pharmaceutical preparations. It is a commer cial product distilled from the wintergreen where it is plentiful, or from the sweet-birch (Bets/a lento). The vario ben of the genus Pyrola are called : een, such as the round-leaved winte common plant with a few orbicular or long-petioled, coriaceous leaves. The flosVe are somewhat like those of the lily of the valley, and are fragrant The spotted wintergreen (Chitna philo mandato) is another plant found in shady woods. It has a decumbent stem, sending up slender branches, which bear a few lanceolate leaves mottled with white, and several white flowers, tinged with purple. Still another wintergreen is the chickweed-wintergreen (Trieatalis oricricasso) a spring blooming herb, with a dainty white, starry blossom, above a whorl of foliage like tiny peach leaves.