Chapter 14
It is the densely bearded, yellow, fifth stamen (_pente_ = five, _stemon_ = a stamen) which gives this flower its scientific name and its chief interest to the structural botanist. From the fact that a blossom has a lip in the centre of the lower half of its corolla, that an insect must use as its landing place, comes the necessity for the pistil to occupy a central position. Naturally, a fifth stamen would be only in its way, an encumbrance to be banished in time. In the figwort, for example, we have seen the fifth stamen reduced, from long sterility, to a mere scale on the roof of the corolla tube; in other lipped flowers, the useless organ has disappeared; but in the beard-tongue, it goes through a series of curious curves from the upper to the under side of the flower to get out of the way of the pistil. Yet it serves an admirable purpose in helping close the mouth of the flower, which the hairy lip alone could not adequately guard against pilferers. A long-tongued bee, thrusting in his head up to his eyes only, receives the pollen in his face. The blossom is male (staminate) in its first stage and female (pistillate) in its second. A western species of the beard-tongue has been selected by gardeners for hybridizing into showy but often less charming flowers.
Snake-head; Turtle-head; Balmony; Shellflower; Cod-head
_Chelone glabra_
_Flowers_--White tinged with pink, or all white, about 1 in. long, growing in a dense, terminal cluster. Calyx 5-parted, bracted at base; corolla irregular broadly tubular, 2-lipped; upper lip arched, swollen, slightly notched;, lower lip 3-lobed, spreading, woolly within; 5 stamens, 1 sterile, 4 in pairs, anther-bearing, woolly; 1 pistil. _Stem:_ 1 to 3 ft. high, erect, smooth, simple, leafy. _Leaves:_ Opposite, lance-shaped, saw-edged.
_Preferred Habitat_--Ditches, beside streams, swamps.
_Flowering Season_--July-September.
_Distribution_--Newfoundland to Florida, and half way across the continent.
It requires something of a struggle for even so strong and vigorous an insect as the bumblebee to gain admission to this inhospitable-looking flower before maturity; and even he abandons the attempt over and over again in its earliest stage before the little heart-shaped anthers are prepared to dust him over. As they mature, it opens slightly, but his weight alone is insufficient to bend down the stiff, yet elastic, lower lip. Energetic prying admits first his head, then he squeezes his body through, brushing past the stamens as he finally disappears inside. At the moment when he is forcing his way in, causing the lower lip to spring up and down, the eyeless turtle seems to chew and chew until the most sedate beholder must smile at the paradoxical show. Of course it is the bee that is feeding, though the flower would seem to be masticating the bee with the keenest relish! The counterfeit tortoise soon disgorges its lively mouthful, however, and away flies the bee, carrying pollen on his velvety back to rub on the stigma of an older flower.
Monkey-flower
_Mimulus ringens_
_Flowers_--Purple, violet, or lilac, rarely whitish; about 1 in. long, solitary, borne on slender footstems from axils of upper leaves. Calyx prismatic, 5-angled, 5-toothed; corolla irregular, tubular, narrow in throat, 2-lipped; upper lip 2-lobed, erect; under lip 3-lobed, spreading; 4 stamens, a long and a short pair, inserted on corolla tube; 1 pistil with 2-lobed, plate-like stigma. _Stem:_ Square, erect, usually branched, 1 to 3 ft. high. _Leaves:_ Opposite, oblong to lance-shaped, saw-edged, mostly seated on stem.
_Preferred Habitat_--Swamps, beside streams and ponds.
_Flowering Season_--June-September.
_Distribution_--Manitoba, Nebraska, and Texas, eastward to Atlantic Ocean.
Imaginative eyes see what appears to them the gaping (_ringens_) face of a little ape or buffoon (_mimulus_) in this common flower whose drolleries, such as they are, call forth the only applause desired--the buzz of insects that become pollen-laden during the entertainment.
Common Speedwell; Fluellin; Paul’s Betony; Groundhele
_Veronica officinalis_
_Flowers_--Pale blue, very small, crowded on spike-like racemes from axils of leaves, often from alternate axils. Calyx 4-parted; corolla of 4 lobes, lower lobe commonly narrowest; 2 divergent stamens inserted at base and on either side of upper corolla lobe; a knob-like stigma on solitary pistil. _Stem:_ From 3 to 10 in. long, hairy, often prostrate, and rooting at joints. _Leaves:_ Opposite, oblong, obtuse, saw-edged, narrowed at base. _Fruit:_ Compressed heart-shaped capsule, containing numerous flat seeds.
_Preferred Habitat_--Dry fields, uplands, open woods.
_Flowering Season_--May-August.
_Distribution_--From Michigan and Tennessee eastward, also from Ontario to Nova Scotia. Probably an immigrant from Europe and Asia.
An ancient tradition of the Roman Church relates that when Jesus was on His way to Calvary, He passed the home of a certain Jewish maiden, who, when she saw drops of agony on His brow, ran after Him along the road to wipe His face with her kerchief. This linen, the monks declared, ever after bore the impress of the sacred features--_vera iconica_, the true likeness. When the Church wished to canonize the pitying maiden, an abbreviated form of the Latin words was given her, St. Veronica, and her kerchief became one of the most precious relics at St. Peter’s, where it is said to be still preserved. Medieval flower lovers, whose piety seems to have been eclipsed only by their imaginations, named this little flower from a fancied resemblance to the relic. Of course, special healing virtue was attributed to the square of pictured linen, and since all could not go to Rome to be cured by it, naturally the next step was to employ the common, wayside plant that bore the saint’s name. Mental healers will not be surprised to learn that because of the strong popular belief in its efficacy to cure all fleshly ills, it actually seemed to possess miraculous powers. For scrofula it was said to be the infallible remedy, and presently we find Linnaeus grouping this flower, and all its relatives, under the family name of _Scrofulariaceae_.
American Brooklime
_Veronica americana_
_Flowers_--Light blue to white, usually striped with deep blue or purple; structure of flower similar to that of _V. officinalis_, but borne in long, loose racemes branching outward on stems that spring from axils of most of the leaves. _Stem:_ Without hairs, usually branched, 6 in. to 3 ft. long, lying partly on ground and rooting from lower joints. _Leaves:_ Oblong, lance-shaped, saw-edged, opposite, petioled, and lacking hairs; 1 to 3 in. long, 1/4 to 1 in. wide. _Fruit:_ A nearly round, compressed, but not flat, capsule with flat seeds in 2 cells.
_Preferred Habitat_--In brooks, ponds, ditches, swamps.
_Flowering Season_--April-September.
_Distribution_--From Atlantic to Pacific, Alaska to California and New Mexico, Quebec to Pennsylvania.
This, the perhaps most beautiful native speedwell, whose sheets of blue along the brookside are so frequently mistaken for masses of forget-me-nots by the hasty observer, of course shows marked differences on closer investigation; its tiny blue flowers are marked with purple pathfinders, and the plant is not hairy, to mention only two. But the poets of England are responsible for most of whatever confusion still lurks in the popular mind concerning these two flowers. Speedwell, a common medieval benediction from a friend, equivalent to our farewell or adieu, and forget-me-not of similar intent, have been used interchangeably by some writers in connection with parting gifts of small blue flowers. It was the germander speedwell that in literature and botanies alike was most commonly known as the forget-me-not for more than two hundred years, or until only fifty years ago. When the _Mayflower_ and her sister ships were launched, “Speedwell” was considered a happier name for a vessel than it proved to be.
Culver’s-root; Culver’s Physic
_Veronica virginica (Leplandra virginica)_
_Flowers_--Small, white or rarely bluish, crowded in dense spike-like racemes 3 to 9 in. long, usually several spikes at top of stem or from upper axils. Calyx 4-parted, very small; corolla tubular, 4-lobed; 2 stamens protruding; 1 pistil. _Stem:_ Straight, erect, usually unbranched, 2 to 7 ft. tall. _Leaves:_ Whorled, from 3 to 9 in a cluster, lance-shaped or oblong, and long-tapering, sharply saw-edged.
_Preferred Habitat_--Rich, moist woods, thickets, meadows.
_Flowering Season_--June-September.
_Distribution_--Nova Scotia to Alabama, west to Nebraska.
“The leaves of the herbage at our feet,” says Ruskin, “take all kinds of strange shapes, as if to invite us to examine them. Star-shaped, heart-shaped, spear-shaped, arrow-shaped, fretted, fringed, cleft, furrowed, serrated, in whorls, in tufts, in wreaths, in spires, endlessly expressive, deceptive, fantastic, never the same from footstalks to blossom, they seem perpetually to tempt our watchfulness, and take delight in outstripping our wonder.” Doubtless light is the factor with the greatest effect in determining the position of the leaves on the stem, if not their shape. After plenty of light has been secured, any aid they may render the flowers in increasing their attractiveness is gladly rendered. Who shall deny that the brilliant foliage of the sumacs, the dogwood, and the pokeweed in autumn does not greatly help them in attracting the attention of migrating birds to their fruit, whose seeds they wish distributed? Or that the clustered leaves of the Dwarf Cornel and Culver’s-root, among others, do not set off to great advantage their white flowers which, when seen by an insect flying overhead, are made doubly conspicuous by the leafy background formed by the whorl?
Downy False Foxglove
_Gerardia flava (Dasystoma flava)_
_Flowers_--Pale yellow, 1-1/2 to 2 in. long; in showy, terminal, leafy bracted racemes. Calyx bell-shaped, 5-toothed; corolla funnel form, the 5 lobes spreading, smooth outside, woolly within; 4 stamens in pairs, woolly; 1 pistil. _Stem:_ Grayish, downy, erect, usually simple, 2 to 4 ft. tall. _Leaves:_ Opposite, lower ones oblong in outline, more or less irregularly lobed and toothed; upper ones small, entire.
_Preferred Habitat_--Gravelly or sandy soil, dry thickets, open woods.
_Flowering Season_--July-August.
_Distribution_--“Eastern Massachusetts to Ontario and Wisconsin, south to southern New York, Georgia, and Mississippi” (Britton and Brown).
In the vegetable kingdom, as in the spiritual, all degree of backsliding sinners may be found, each branded with a mark of infamy according to its deserts. We see how the dodder vine lost both leaf and roots after it consented to live wholly by theft of its hard-working host’s juices through suckers that penetrate to the vitals; how the Indian Pipe’s blanched face tells the story of guilt perpetrated under cover of darkness in the soil below; how the broom-rape and beech-drops lost their honest green color; and, finally, the foxgloves show us plants with their faces so newly turned toward the path of perdition, their larceny so petty, that only the expert in criminal botany cases condemns them. Like its cousins the gerardias, the Downy False Foxglove is only a partial parasite, attaching its roots by disks or suckers to the roots of white oak or witch hazel; not only that, but, quite as frequently, groping blindly in the dark, it fastens suckers on its own roots, actually thieving from itself! It is this piratical tendency which makes transplanting of foxgloves into our gardens so very difficult, even when lifted with plenty of their beloved vegetable mould. The term false foxglove, it should be explained, is by no means one of reproach for dishonesty; it was applied simply to distinguish this group of plants from the true foxgloves cultivated, not wild, here, which yield digitalis to the doctors.
Large Purple Gerardia
_Gerardia purpurea_
_Flowers_--Bright purplish pink, deep magenta, or pale to whitish, about 1 in. long and broad, growing along the rigid, spreading branches. Calyx 5-toothed; corolla funnel form, the tube much inflated above and spreading into 5 unequal, rounded lobes, spotted within, or sometimes downy; 4 stamens in pairs, the filaments hairy; 1 pistil. _Stem:_ 1 to 2-1/2 ft. high, slender, branches erect or spreading. _Leaves:_ Opposite, very narrow, 1 to 1-1/2 in. long.
_Preferred Habitat_--Low fields and meadows; moist, sandy soil.
_Flowering Season_--August-October.
_Distribution_--Northern United States to Florida, chiefly along Atlantic Coast.
It is a special pity to gather the gerardias, which, as they grow, seem to enjoy life to the full, and when picked, to be so miserable they turn black as they dry. Like their relatives the foxgloves, they are difficult to transplant except with a large ball of soil, because it is said they are more or less parasitic, fastening their roots on those of other plants. When robbery becomes flagrant, Nature brands sinners in the vegetable kingdom by taking away their color, and perhaps their leaves, as in the case of the broom-rape and Indian Pipe; but the fair faces of the gerardias and foxgloves give no hint of the petty thefts committed under cover of darkness in the soil below.
Scarlet Painted Cup; Indian Paint-brush
_Castilleja coccinea_
_Flowers_--Greenish yellow, enclosed by broad, vermilion, 3-cleft floral bracts; borne in a terminal spike. Calyx flattened, tubular, cleft above and below into 2 lobes; usually green, sometimes scarlet; corolla very irregular, the upper lip long and arched, the short lower lip 3-lobed; 4 unequal stamens; 1 pistil. _Stem:_ 1 to 2 ft. high, usually unbranched, hairy. _Leaves:_ Lower ones tufted, oblong, mostly uncut; stem leaves deeply cleft into 3 to 5 segments, sessile.
_Preferred Habitat_--Meadows, prairies, mountains, moist, sandy soil.
_Flowering Season_--May-July.
_Distribution_--Maine to Manitoba, south to Virginia, Kansas, and Texas.
Here and there the meadows show a touch of as vivid a red as that in which Vibert delighted to dip his brush.
“Scarlet tufts Are glowing in the green like flakes of fire; The wanderers of the prairie know them well, And call that brilliant flower the ‘painted cup.’”
Thoreau, who objected to this name, thought flame flower a better one, the name the Indians gave to Oswego Tea; but here the floral bracts, not the flowers themselves, are on fire. Whole mountainsides in the Canadian Rockies are ablaze with the Indian Paint-brushes that range in color there from ivory white and pale salmon through every shade of red to deep maroon--a gorgeous conflagration of color. Lacking good, honest, deep green, one suspects from the yellowish tone of calices, stem, and leaves that this plant is something of a thief. That it still possesses foliage, proves only petty larceny against it, similar to the foxglove’s. The roots of our painted cup occasionally break in and steal from the roots of its neighbors such juices as the plant must work over into vegetable tissue. Therefore it still needs leaves, indispensable parts of a digestive apparatus. Were it wholly given up to piracy, like the dodder, or as parasitic as the Indian Pipe, even the green and the leaf that it hath would be taken away.
Wood Betony; Lousewort; Beefsteak Plant; High Heal-all
_Pedicularis canadensis_
_Flowers_--Greenish yellow and purplish red, in a short, dense spike. Calyx oblique, tubular, cleft on lower side, and with 2 or 3 scallops on upper; corolla about 3/4 in. long, 2-lipped, the upper lip arched, concave, the lower 3-lobed; 4 stamens in pairs; 1 pistil. _Stems:_ Clustered, simple, hairy, 6 to 18 in. high. _Leaves:_ Mostly tufted, oblong lance-shaped in outline, and pinnately lobed.
_Preferred Habitat_--Dry, open woods and thickets.
_Flowering Season_--April-June.
_Distribution_--Nova Scotia to Florida, westward to Manitoba, Colorado, and Kansas.
When the Italians wish to extol some one they say, “He has more virtues than betony,” alluding, of course, to the European species, _Betonica officinalis_, a plant that was worn about the neck and cultivated in cemeteries during the Middle Ages as a charm against evil spirits; and prepared into plasters, ointments, syrups, and oils, was supposed to cure every ill that flesh is heir to. Our commonest American species fulfils its mission in beautifying roadside banks, and dry open woods and copses with thick, short spikes of bright flowers, that rise above large rosettes of coarse, hairy, fern-like foliage. At first, these flowers, beloved of bumblebees, are all greenish yellow; but as the spike lengthens with increased bloom, the arched, upper lip of the blossom becomes dark purplish red, the lower one remains pale yellow, and the throat turns reddish, while some of the beefsteak color often creeps into stems and leaves as well.
Farmers once believed that after their sheep fed on the foliage of this group of plants a skin disease, produced by a certain tiny louse (_pediculus_), would attack them--hence our innocent betony’s repellent name.
BROOM-RAPE FAMILY (_Orobanchaceae_)
Beech-drops
_Epifagus virginiana_
_Flowers_--Small, dull purple and white, tawny, or brownish striped; scattered along loose, tiny bracted, ascending branches. _Stem:_ Brownish or reddish tinged, slender, tough, branching above, 6 in. to 2 ft. tall, from brittle, fibrous roots.
_Preferred Habitat_--Under beech, oak, and chestnut trees.
_Flowering Season_--August-October.
_Distribution_--New Brunswick, westward to Ontario and Missouri, south to the Gulf states.
Nearly related to the broom-rape is this less attractive pirate, a taller, brownish-purple plant, with a disagreeable odor, whose erect, branching stem without leaves is still furnished with brownish scales, the remains of what were once green leaves in virtuous ancestors, no doubt. But perhaps even these relics of honesty may one day disappear. Nature brands every sinner somehow; and the loss of green from a plant’s leaves may be taken as a certain indication that theft of another’s food stamps it with this outward and visible sign of guilt. The grains of green to which foliage owes its color are among the most essential of products to honest vegetables that have to grub in the soil for a living, since it is only in such cells as contain it that assimilation of food can take place. As chlorophyll, or leaf-green, acts only under the influence of light and air, most plants expose all the leaf surface possible; but a parasite, which absorbs from others juices already assimilated, certainly has no use for chlorophyll, nor for leaves either; and in the broom-rape, beech-drops, and Indian Pipe, among other thieves, we see leaves degenerated into bracts more or less without color, according to the extent of their crime. Now they cannot manufacture carbo-hydrates, even if they would, any more than fungi can. The beech-drop bears cleistogamous or blind flowers in addition to the few showy ones needed to attract insects.
MADDER FAMILY (_Rubiaceae_)
Partridge Vine, Twin-berry; Mitchella Vine; Squaw-berry
_Mitchella repens_
_Flowers_--Waxy, white (pink in bud), fragrant, growing in pairs at ends of the branches. Calyx usually 4-lobed; corolla funnel form, about 1/2 in. long, the 4 spreading lobes bearded within; 4 stamens inserted on corolla throat; 1 style with 4 stigmas; the ovaries of the twin flowers united (The style is long when the stamens are short, or _vice versa_.) _Stem:_ Slender, trailing, rooting at joints, 6 to 12 in. long, with numerous erect branches. _Leaves:_ Opposite, entire, short petioled, oval or rounded, evergreen, dark, sometimes white veined. _Fruit:_ A small, red, edible, double berry-like drupe.
_Preferred Habitat_--Woods; usually, but not always, dry ones.
_Flowering Season_--April-June. Sometimes again in autumn.
_Distribution_--Nova Scotia to the Gulf states, westward to Minnesota and Texas.
A carpet of these dark, shining, little evergreen leaves, spread at the foot of forest trees, whether sprinkled over in June with pairs of waxy, cream-white, pink-tipped, velvety, lilac-scented flowers that suggest attenuated arbutus blossoms, or with coral-red “berries” in autumn and winter, is surely one of the loveliest sights in the woods. Transplanted to the home garden in closely packed, generous clumps, with plenty of leaf mould, or, better still, chopped sphagnum, about them, they soon spread into thick mats in the rockery, the hardy fernery, or about the roots of rhododendrons and the taller shrubs that permit some sunlight to reach them. No woodland creeper rewards our care with greater luxuriance of growth. Growing near our homes, the Partridge Vine offers an excellent opportunity for study.
What endless confusion arises through giving the same popular folk-names to different species! The Bob White, which is called quail in New England or wherever the ruffed grouse is known as partridge, is called partridge in the Middle and Southern states, where the ruffed grouse is known as pheasant. But as both these distributing agents, like most winter rovers, whether bird or beast, are inordinately fond of this tasteless partridge berry, as well as of the spicy fruit of quite another species, the aromatic wintergreen, which shares with it a number of common names, every one may associate whatever bird and berry best suit him. The delicious little twin-flower beloved of Linnaeus also comes in for a share of lost identity through confusion with the Partridge Vine.
Button-bush; Honey-balls; Globe-flower; Button-ball Shrub; River-bush
_Cephalanthus occidentalis_
_Flowers_--Fragrant, white, small, tubular, hairy within, 4-parted, the long, yellow-tipped style far protruding; the florets clustered on a fleshy receptacle, in round heads (about 1 in. across), elevated on long peduncles from leaf axils or ends of branches. _Stem:_ A shrub 3 to 12 ft. high. _Leaves:_ Opposite or in small whorls, petioled, oval, tapering at the tip, entire.
_Preferred Habitat_--Beside streams and ponds; swamps, low ground.
_Flowering Season_--June-September.
_Distribution_--New Brunswick to Florida and Cuba, westward to Arizona and California.
Delicious fragrance, faintly suggesting jessamine, leads one over marshy ground to where the button-bush displays dense, creamy-white globes of bloom, heads that Miss Lounsberry aptly likens to “little cushions full of pins.” Not far away the sweet breath of the white-spiked Clethra comes at the same season, and one cannot but wonder why these two bushes, which are so beautiful when most garden shrubbery is out of flower, should be left to waste their sweetness, if not on desert air exactly, on air that blows far from the homes of men. Partially shaded and sheltered positions near a house, if possible, suit these water-lovers admirably. Cultivation only increases their charms. We have not so many fragrant wild flowers that any can be neglected. John Burroughs, who included the blossoms of several trees in his list of fragrant ones, found only thirty-odd species in New England and New York.
Bluets; Innocence; Houstonia; Quaker Ladies; Quaker Bonnets; Venus’ Pride
_Houstonia caerulea_
_Flowers_--Very small, light to purplish blue or white, with yellow centre, and borne at end of each erect slender stem that rises from 3 to 7 in. high. Corolla funnel-shaped, with 4 oval, pointed, spreading lobes that equal the slender tube in length; rarely the corolla has more divisions; 4 stamens inserted on tube of corolla; 2 stigmas; calyx 4-lobed. _Leaves:_ Opposite, seated on stem, oblong, tiny; the lower ones spatulate. _Fruit:_ A 2-lobed pod, broader than long, its upper half free from calyx; seeds deeply concave. _Root-stalk:_ Slender, spreading, forming dense tufts.
_Preferred Habitat_--Moist meadows, wet rocks and banks.