Chapter 13

_Flowers_--Very small, purplish blue, in numerous slender, erect, compact spikes. Calyx 5-toothed; corolla tubular, unequally 5-lobed; 2 pairs of stamens; 1 pistil. _Stem:_ 3 to 7 ft. high, rough, branched above, leafy, 4-sided. _Leaves:_ Opposite, stemmed, lance-shaped, saw-edged rough, lower ones lobed at base.

_Preferred Habitat--_Moist meadows, roadsides, waste places.

_Flowering Season_--June-September.

_Distribution_--United States and Canada in almost every part.

Seeds below, a circle of insignificant purple-blue flowers in the centre, and buds at the top of the vervain’s slender spires do not produce a striking effect, yet this common plant certainly does not lack beauty. John Burroughs, ever ready to say a kindly, appreciative word for any weed, speaks of its drooping, knotted threads, that “make a pretty etching upon the winter snow.” Bees, the vervain’s benefactors, are usually seen clinging to the blooming spikes, and apparently asleep on them. Borrowing the name of Simpler’s Joy from its European sister, the flower has also appropriated much of the tradition and folk-lore centred about that plant which herb-gatherers, or simplers, truly delighted to see, since none was once more salable.

Ages before Christians ascribed healing virtues to the vervain--found growing on Mount Calvary, and therefore possessing every sort of miraculous power, according to the logic of simple peasant folk--the Druids had counted it among their sacred plants. “When the dog-star arose from unsunned spots” the priests gathered it. Did not Shakespeare’s witches learn some of their uncanny rites from these reverend men of old? One is impressed with the striking similarity of many customs recorded of both. Two of the most frequently used ingredients in witches cauldrons were the vervain and the rue. “The former probably derived its notoriety from the fact of its being sacred to Thor, an honor which marked it out, like other lightning plants, as peculiarly adapted for occult uses,” says Mr. Thiselton Dyer in his “Folk-lore of Plants.” “Although vervain, therefore, as the enchanter’s plant, was gathered by witches to do mischief in their incantations, yet, as Aubrey says, it ‘hinders witches from their will,’ a circumstance to which Drayton further refers when he speaks of the vervain as ‘’gainst witchcraft much avayling.’” Now we understand why the children of Shakespeare’s time hung vervain and dill with a horseshoe over the door.

In his eighth Eclogue, Virgil refers to vervain as a charm to recover lost love. Doubtless this was the verbena, the _herba sacra_ employed in ancient Roman sacrifices, according to Pliny. In his day the bridal wreath was of _verbena_, gathered by the bride herself.

MINT FAMILY _(Labiatae)_

Mad-dog Skullcap or Helmet-flower; Mad weed; Hoodwort

_Scutellaria lateriflora_

_Flowers_--Blue, varying to whitish; several or many, 1/4 in. long, growing in axils of upper leaves or in 1-sided spike-like racemes. Calyx 2-lipped, the upper lip with a helmet-like protuberance; corolla 2-lipped; the lower, 3-lobed lip spreading; the middle lobe larger than the side ones. Stamens, 4, in pairs, under the upper lip; upper pair the shorter; 1 pistil, the style unequally cleft in two. _Stem:_ Square, smooth, leafy, branched, 8 in. to 2 ft. high. _Leaves:_ Opposite, oblong to lance-shaped, thin, toothed, on slender pedicles, 1 to 3 in. long, growing gradually smaller toward top of stem. _Fruit:_ 4 nutlets.

_Preferred Habitat_--Wet, shady ground.

_Flowering Season_--July-September.

_Distribution_--Uneven throughout United States and the British Possessions.

By the helmet-like appendage on the upper lip of the calyx, which to the imaginative mind of Linnaeus suggested _Scutellum_ (a little dish), which children delight to spring open for a view of the four tiny seeds attached at the base when in fruit, one knows this to be a member of the skullcap tribe, a widely scattered genus of blue and violet two-lipped flowers, some small to the point of insignificance, like the present species, others showy enough for the garden, but all rich in nectar, and eagerly sought by their good friends, the bees.

The Larger or Hyssop Skullcap (_S. integrifolia_) rarely has a dent in its rounded oblong leaves, which, like the stem, are covered with fine down. Its lovely, bright blue flowers, an inch long, the lips of about equal length, are grouped opposite each other at the top of a stem that never lifts them higher than two feet; and so their beauty is often concealed in the tall grass of roadsides and meadows and the undergrowth of woods and thickets, where they bloom from May to August, from southern New England to the Gulf of Mexico, westward to Texas.

Self-heal; Heal-all; Blue Curls; Heart-of-the-Earth; Brunella; Carpenter-weed

_Prunella vulgaris_

_Flowers_--Purple and violet, in dense spikes, somewhat resembling a clover head; from 1/2 to 1 in. long in flower, becoming 4 times the length in fruit. Corolla tubular, irregularly 2-lipped, the upper lip darker and hood-like; the lower one 3-lobed, spreading, the middle and largest lobe fringed; 4 twin-like stamens ascending under upper lip; filaments of the lower and longer pair 2-toothed at summit, one of the teeth bearing an anther, the other tooth sterile; style thread-like, shorter than stamens, and terminating in a 2-cleft stigma. Calyx 2-parted, half the length of corolla, its teeth often hairy on edges. _Stem:_ 2 in. to 2 ft. high, erect or reclining, simple or branched. _Leaves:_ Opposite, oblong. _Fruit:_ 4 nutlets, round and smooth.

_Preferred Habitat_--Fields, roadsides, waste places.

_Flowering Season_--May-October

_Distribution_--North America, Europe, Asia.

This humble, rusty green plant, weakly lopping over the surrounding grass, so that often only its insignificant purple, clover-like flower-heads are visible, is another of those immigrants from the old countries which, having proved fittest in the fiercer struggle for existence there, has soon after its introduction here exceeded most of our more favored native flowers in numbers. Everywhere we find the heal-all, sometimes dusty and stunted by the roadside, sometimes truly beautiful in its fresh purple, violet, and white when perfectly developed under happy conditions. In England, where most flowers are deeper hued than with us, the heal-all is rich purple. What is the secret of this flower’s successful march across three continents? As usual, the chief reason is to be found in the facility it offers insects to secure food; and the quantity of fertile seed it is therefore able to ripen as the result of their visits is its reward. Also, its flowering season is unusually long, and it is a tireless bloomer. It is finical in no respect; its sprawling stems root easily at the joints, and it is very hardy.

Motherwort

_Leonurus Cardiaca_

_Flowers_--Dull purple pink, pale purple, or white, small, clustered in axils of upper leaves. Calyx tubular, bell-shaped, with 5 rigid awl-like teeth; corolla 2-lipped, upper lip arched, woolly without; lower lip 3-lobed, spreading, mottled; the tube with oblique ring of hairs inside. Four twin-like stamens, anterior pair longer, reaching under upper lip; style 2-cleft at summit. _Stem:_ 2 to 5 ft. tall, straight, branched, leafy, purplish. _Leaves:_ Opposite, on slender petioles; lower ones rounded, 2 to 4 in. broad, palmately cut into 2 to 5 lobes; upper leaves narrower, 3-cleft or 3-toothed.

_Preferred Habitat_--Waste places near dwellings.

_Flowering Season_--June-September.

_Distribution_--Nova Scotia southward to North Carolina, west to Minnesota and Nebraska. Naturalized from Europe and Asia.

How the bees love this generous, old-fashioned entertainer! One nearly always sees them clinging to the close whorls of flowers that are strung along the stem, and of course transferring pollen, in recompense, as they journey on. A more credulous generation imported the plant for its alleged healing virtues. What is the significance of its Greek name, meaning a lion’s tail? Let no one suggest, by a far-stretched metaphor, that our grandmothers, in Revolutionary days, enjoyed pulling it to vent their animosity against the British.

Oswego Tea; Bee Balm; Indian’s Plume; Fragrant Balm; Mountain Mint

_Monarda didyma_

_Flowers_--Scarlet, clustered in a solitary, terminal, rounded head of dark-red calices, with leafy bracts below it. Calyx narrow, tubular, sharply 5-toothed; corolla tubular, widest at the mouth, 2-lipped, 1 1/2 to 2 inches long; 2 long, anther-bearing stamens ascending, protruding; 1 pistil; the style 2-cleft. _Stem:_ 2 to 3 ft. tall. _Leaves:_ Aromatic, opposite, dark green, oval to oblong lance-shaped, sharply saw-edged, of ten hairy beneath, petioled; upper leaves and bracts often red.

_Preferred Habitat_--Moist soil, especially near streams, in hilly or mountainous regions.

_Flowering Season_--July-September.

_Distribution_--Canada to Georgia, west to Michigan.

Gorgeous, glowing scarlet heads of Bee Balm arrest the dullest eye, bracts and upper leaves often taking on blood-red color, too, as if it had dripped from the lacerated flowers. Where their vivid doubles are reflected in a shadowy mountain stream, not even the Cardinal Flower is more strikingly beautiful. Thrifty clumps transplanted from Nature’s garden will spread about ours and add a splendor like the flowers of salvia, next of kin, if only the roots get a frequent soaking.

With even longer flower tubes than the Wild Bergamot’s the Bee Balm belies its name, for, however frequently bees may come about for nectar when it rises high, only long-tongued bumblebees could get enough to compensate for their trouble. Butterflies, which suck with their wings in motion, plumb the depths. The ruby-throated humming bird--to which the Brazilian salvia of our gardens has adapted itself--flashes about these whorls of Indian plumes just as frequently--of course transferring pollen on his needle-like bill as he darts from flower to flower. Even the protruding stamens and pistil take on the prevailing hue. Most of the small, blue, or purple flowered members of the mint family cater to bees by wearing their favorite color; the bergamot charms butterflies with magenta, and tubes so deep the short-tongued mob cannot pilfer their sweets; and from the frequency of the humming bird’s visits, from the greater depth of the Bee Balm’s tubes and their brilliant, flaring red--an irresistibly attractive color to the ruby-throat--it would appear that this is a bird flower. Certainly its adaptation is quite as perfect as the salvia’s. Mischievous bees and wasps steal nectar they cannot reach legitimately through bungholes of their own making in the bottom of the slender casks.

Wild Bergamot

_Monarda fistulosa_

_Flowers_--Extremely variable, purplish lavender, magenta, rose, pink, yellowish pink, or whitish, dotted; clustered in a solitary, nearly flat terminal head. Calyx tubular, narrow, 5-toothed, very hairy within. Corolla 1 to 1-1/2 in. long, tubular, 2-lipped, upper lip erect, toothed; lower lip spreading, 3-lobed, middle lobe longest; 2 anther-bearing stamens protruding; 1 pistil; the style 2-lobed. _Stem:_ 2 to 3 ft. high, rough, branched. _Leaves:_ Opposite, lance-shaped, saw-edged, on slender petioles; aromatic; bracts and upper leaves whitish or the color of flower.

_Preferred Habitat_--Open woods, thickets, dry rocky hills.

_Flowering Season_--June-September.

_Distribution_--Eastern Canada and Maine, westward to Minnesota, south to Gulf of Mexico.

Only a few bergamot flowers open at a time; the rest of the slightly rounded head, thickly set with hairy calices, looks as if it might be placed in a glass cup and make an excellent penwiper. If the cultivated human eye (and stomach) revolt at magenta, it is ever a favorite shade with butterflies. They flutter in ecstasy over the gay flowers; indeed, they are the principal visitors and benefactors, for the erect corollas, exposed organs, and level-topped heads are well adapted to their requirements.

NIGHTSHADE FAMILY _(Solanaceae)_

Nightshade; Blue Bindweed; Felonwort; Bittersweet; Scarlet or Snake Berry; Poison-flower; Woody Nightshade

_Solanum Dulcamara_

_Flowers_--Blue, purple, or, rarely, white with greenish spots on each lobe; about 1/2 in. broad, clustered in slender, drooping cymes. Calyx 5-lobed, oblong, persistent on the berry; corolla deeply, sharply 5-cleft, wheel-shaped, or points curved backward; 5 stamens inserted on throat, yellow, protruding, the anthers united to form a cone; stigma small. _Stem:_ Climbing or straggling, woody below, branched, 2 to 8 ft. long. _Leaves:_ Alternate, 2 to 4 in. long, 1 to 2 1/2 in. wide, pointed at the apex, usually heart-shaped at base; some with 2 distinct leaflets below on the petiole, others have leaflets united with leaf like lower lobes or wings. _Fruit:_ A bright red, oval berry.

_Preferred Habitat_--Moist thickets, fence rows.

_Flowering Season_--May-September.

_Distribution_--United States east of Kansas, north of New Jersey. Canada, Europe, and Asia.

More beautiful than the graceful flowers are the drooping cymes of bright berries, turning from green to yellow, then to orange and scarlet, in the tangled thicket by the shady roadside in autumn, when the unpretending, shrubby vine, that has crowded its way through the rank midsummer vegetation, becomes a joy to the eye. Another bittersweet, so-called, festoons the hedgerows with yellow berries which, bursting, show their scarlet-coated seeds. Rose hips and mountain-ash berries, among many other conspicuous bits of color, arrest attention, but not for us were they designed. Now the birds are migrating, and, hungry with then-long flight, they gladly stop to feed upon fare so attractive. Hard, indigestible seeds traverse the alimentary canal without alteration and are deposited many miles from the parent that bore them. Nature’s methods for widely distributing plants cannot but stir the dullest imagination.

Jamestown Weed; Thorn Apple; Stramonium; Jimson Weed; Devil’s Trumpet

_Datura Stramonium_

_Flowers_--Showy, large, about 4 in. high, solitary, erect, growing from the forks of branches. Calyx tubular, nearly half as long as the corolla, 5-toothed, prismatic; corolla funnel-form, deep-throated, the spreading limb 2 in. across or less, plaited, 5-pointed; stamens 5; 1 pistil. _Stem:_ Stout, branching, smooth, 1 to 5 ft. high. _Leaves:_ Alternate, large, rather thin, petioled, egg-shaped in outline, the edges irregularly wavy-toothed or angled; rank-scented. _Fruit:_ A densely prickly, egg-shaped capsule, the lower prickles smallest. The seeds and stems contain a powerful narcotic poison.

_Preferred Habitat_--Light soil, fields, waste land near dwellings, rubbish heaps.

_Flowering Season_--June-September.

_Distribution_--Nova Scotia to the Gulf of Mexico, westward beyond the Mississippi.

When we consider that there are more than five million Gypsies wandering about the globe, and that the narcotic seeds of the Thorn Apple, which apparently heal, as well as poison, have been a favorite medicine of theirs for ages, we can understand at least one means of the weed reaching these shores from tropical Asia. (Hindoo, _dhatura_.) Our Indians, who call it “white man’s plant,” associate it with the Jamestown settlement--a plausible connection, for Raleigh’s colonists would have been likely to carry with them to the New World the seeds of an herb yielding an alkaloid more esteemed in the England of their day than the alkaloid of opium known as morphine. Daturina, the narcotic, and another product, known in medicine as stramonium, smoked by asthmatics, are by no means despised by up-to-date practitioners. Were it not for the rank odor of its leaves, the vigorous weed, coarse as it is, would be welcome in men’s gardens. Indeed, many of its similar relatives adorn them. The fragrant petunia and tobacco plants of the flower beds, the potato, tomato, and egg-plant in the kitchen garden, call it cousin.

FIGWORT FAMILY _(Scrophulariaceae)_

Great Mullein; Velvet or Flannel Plant; Mullein Dock; Aaron’s Rod

_Verbascum Thapsus_

_Flowers_--Yellow, 1 in. across or less, seated around a thick, dense, elongated spike. Calyx 5-parted; corolla of 5 rounded lobes; 5 anther-bearing stamens, the 3 upper ones short, woolly; 1 pistil. _Stem:_ Stout, 2 to 7 ft. tall, densely woolly, with branched hairs. _Leaves:_ Thick, pale green, velvety-hairy, oblong, in a rosette oil the ground; others alternate, strongly clasping the stem.

_Preferred Habitat_--Dry fields, banks, stony waste land.

_Flowering Season_--June-September.

_Distribution_--Minnesota and Kansas, eastward to Nova Scotia and Florida. Europe.

Leaving the fluffy thistle-down he has been kindly scattering to the four winds, the goldfinch spreads his wings for a brief, undulating flight, singing in waves also as he goes to where tall, thick-set mullein stalks stand like sentinels above the stony pasture. Here companies of the exquisite little black and yellow minstrels delight to congregate with their sombre families and feast on the seeds that rapidly follow the erratic flowers up the gradually lengthening spikes.

“I have come three thousand miles to see the mullein cultivated in a garden, and christened the velvet plant,” says John Burroughs in “An October Abroad.” But even in England it grows wild, and much more abundantly in southern Europe, while its specific name is said to have been given it because it was so common in the neighborhood of Thapsus; but whether the place of that name in Africa, or the Sicilian town mentioned by Ovid and Virgil, is not certain. Strange that Europeans should labor under the erroneous impression that this mullein is native to America, whereas here it is only an immigrant from their own land. Rapidly taking its course of empire westward from our seaports into which the seeds smuggled their passage among the ballast, it is now more common in the Eastern states, perhaps, than any native. Forty or more folk-names have been applied to it, mostly in allusion to its alleged curative powers, its use for candle-wick and funeral torches in the Middle Ages. The generic title, first used by Pliny, is thought to be a corruption of _Barbascum_ (= with beards) in allusion to the hairy filaments or, as some think, to the leaves.

Of what use is this felt-like covering to the plant? The importance of protecting the delicate, sensitive, active cells from intense light, draught, or cold, have led various plants to various practices; none more common, however, than to develop hairs on the epidermis of their leaves, sometimes only enough to give it a downy appearance, sometimes to coat it with felt, as in this case, where the hairs branch and interlace. Fierce sunlight in the exposed dry situations where the mullein grows; prolonged drought, which often occurs at flowering season, when the perpetuation of the species is at stake; and the intense cold which the exquisite rosettes formed by year-old plants must endure through a winter before they can send up a flower-stalk the second spring--these trials the well-screened, juicy, warm plant has successfully surmounted through its coat of felt. Humming birds have been detected gathering the hairs to line their tiny nests. The light, strong stalk makes almost as good a cane as bamboo, especially when the root end, in running under a stone, forms a crooked handle. Pale country beauties rub their cheeks with the velvety leaves to make them rosy.

Moth Mullein

_Verbascum Blattaria_

_Flowers_--Yellow, or frequently white, 5-parted, about 1 in. broad, marked with brown; borne on spreading pedicles in a long, loose raceme; all the filaments with violet hairs; 1 protruding pistil. _Stem:_ Erect, slender, simple, about 2 ft. high, sometimes less, or much taller. _Leaves:_ Seldom present at flowering time; oblong to ovate, toothed, mostly sessile, smooth.

_Preferred Habitat_--Dry, open waste land; roadsides, fields.

_Flowering Season_--June-November.

_Distribution_--Naturalized from Europe and Asia, more or less common throughout the United States and Canada.

“Of beautiful weeds quite a long list might be made without including any of the so-called wild flowers,” says John Burroughs. “A favorite of mine is the little Moth Mullein that blooms along the highway, and about the fields, and maybe upon the edge of the lawn.” Even in winter, when the slender stem, set with round brown seed-vessels, rises above the snow, the plant is pleasing to the human eye, as it is to that of hungry birds.

Butter-and-eggs; Yellow Toadflax; Eggs-and-bacon; Flaxweed; Brideweed

_Linaria vulgaris_

_Flowers_--Light canary yellow and orange, 1 in. long or over, irregular, borne in terminal, leafy-bracted spikes. Corolla spurred at the base, 2-lipped, the upper lip erect, 2-lobed; the lower lip spreading, 3-lobed, its base an orange-colored palate closing the throat; 4 stamens in pairs within; 1 pistil. _Stem:_ 1 to 3 ft. tall, slender, leafy. _Leaves:_ Pale, grass-like.

_Preferred Habitat_--Waste land, roadsides, banks, fields.

_Flowering Season_--June-October.

_Distribution_--Nebraska and Manitoba, eastward to Virginia and Nova Scotia. Europe and Asia.

An immigrant from Europe, this plebeian perennial, meekly content with waste places, is rapidly inheriting the earth. Its beautiful spikes of butter-colored cornucopias, apparently holding the yolk of a diminutive egg, emit a cheesy odor, suggesting a close dairy. Perhaps half the charm of the plant--and its charms increase greatly when it is grown in a garden--consists in the pale bluish-green grass-like leaves with a bloom on the surface, which are put forth so abundantly from the sterile shoots.

Blue or Wild Toadflax; Blue Linaria

_Linaria canadensis_

_Flowers_--Pale blue to purple, small, irregular, in slender spikes. Calyx 5 pointed;-corolla 2-lipped, with curved spur longer than its tube, which is nearly closed by a white, 2-ridged projection or palate; the upper lip erect, 2-lobed; lower lip 3-lobed, spreading. Stamens 4, in pairs, in throat; 1 pistil. _Stem:_ Slender, weak, of sterile shoots, prostrate; flowering stem, ascending or erect, 4 in. to 2 ft. high. _Leaves:_ Small, linear, alternately scattered along stem, or oblong in pairs or threes on leafy sterile shoots.

_Preferred Habitat_--Dry soil, gravel or sand.

_Flowering Season_--May-October.

_Distribution_--North, Central, and South Americas.

Wolf, rat, mouse, sow, cow, cat, snake, dragon, dog, toad, are among the many animal prefixes to the names of flowers that the English country people have given for various and often most interesting reasons. Just as dog, used as a prefix, expresses an idea of worthlessness to them, so toad suggests a spurious plant; the toadflax being made to bear what is meant to be an odious name because before flowering it resembles the true flax, _linum_, from which the generic title is derived.

Hairy Beard-tongue

_Pentstemon hirsutus_ (P. _pubescens_)

_Flowers_--Dull violet or lilac and white, about 1 in. long, borne in a loose spike. Calyx 5-parted, the sharply pointed sepals overlapping; corolla, a gradually inflated tube widening where the mouth divides into a 2-lobed upper lip and a 3-lobed lower lip; the throat nearly closed by hairy palate at base of lower lip; sterile fifth stamen densely bearded for half its length; 4 anther-bearing stamens, the anthers divergent. _Stem:_ 1 to 3 ft. high, erect, downy above. _Leaves:_ Oblong to lance-shaped, upper ones seated on stem; lower ones narrowed into petioles.

_Preferred Habitat_--Dry or rocky fields, thickets, and open woods.

_Flowering Season_--May-July.

_Distribution_--Ontario to Florida, Manitoba to Texas.