. In a recent number of the Gardeners' Monthly, the Editor, in reply to a query from a reader, explains the name "Ladies' Traces" as being due to the fancied resemblance of the twisted spikes of the plants to which it is applied, to the silken cords called "traces," used in olden times to lace up dresses. I am inclined to think the Editor is wrong. I can find no authority for such use of the word. Trace, as a synonym for lace [a cord. Ed. G. M.] would be as inelegant as "gallusses" for suspenders. "Lady's" or "Ladies' Tresses" is a very modern plant-name, and was invented, probably, as a supposed correction of " Lady's Traces," the old and correct name of the plant. When I say the plant, I mean the species to which the name was originally applied, Spiranthes autumnalis, Rich. "Lady's Traces" is an abbreviation of "Our Lady's Traces," just as " Lady's Slipper" is an abbreviation of "Our Lady's Slipper," the reference being to the Virgin Mary. I can see but one meaning to the name "Our Lady's Traces:" it is undoubtedly due to an old, and now forgotten, legend which ascribed the origin of the plant to the "traces" or "footprints" of the Virgin.

[Not perhaps lace, but "rope" or "cord," and the word is yet used for the ropes, cords or straps that enter into draught harness. Tracing or trussing was synonymous with cording up or lacing, by the peasantry among whom the writer of this was educated in the Old World. The part of the country in which that was located had been cut off for centuries with much intercourse with the more progressive portions, and words dropped for a hundred years elsewhere were still common there. By a note in Sir Walter Scott's Monastery, chapter 14, it would seem to have been in as common use in the north of England as in the extreme south. " I will," answered Father Eustace, " but I hear the gull clamorous for some one to truss his points." (Note. - "The points were the ends of the strings of cord or ribands, so-called because pointed with metal like the laces of women's stays which attached the doublet to the hose. They were very numerous and required assistance to tie them properly, which was called trussing-")

Aside from all this, Ladies' Traces is the early name. So far as we know, it- was changed first by Dr. Curtis, a writer about a hundred years ago, simply because he did not know what traces were. Because he did not know, he guessed it to be tresses. Moreover, there is nothing in the flower of a Spiranthes to suggest a tress; for, if we understand the word, hair when done up in the cord-like twist that this flower presents, would be anything but a "tress." Our correspondent's reference to traces or foot-prints, may have been due to some forgotten legend in which the Virgin Mary had a place; but, there is nothing whatever in the flower its-self to suggest any such an application. Is there such a legend?

It seems better to stick to the original word as handed down to us - trace - and leave to the accidental stumbling of some explorer in old literature for the true meaning of it.

Our sole object is, to protest against the modern change of traces to tresses, and to show that there is quite as good reason, if not better, for the original orthography than for the modern change. In this at least Mr. Gerard agrees with us. - Ed. G. M].