Wild Flowers Worth Knowing Part 25

Years ago, when simple folk believed G.o.d had marked plants with some sign to indicate the special use for which each was intended, they regarded the spotted stem of the bugloss, and its seeds shaped like a serpent's head, as certain indications that the herb would cure snake bites. Indeed, the genus takes its name from _Echis_, the Greek viper.

VERVAIN FAMILY _(Verbenaceae)_

Blue Vervain; Wild Hyssop; Simpler's Joy

_Verbena hastata_

_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 circ.u.mstance 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 _(l.a.b.i.atae)_

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 gra.s.s 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 gra.s.s, 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 quant.i.ty 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, cl.u.s.tered 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, cl.u.s.tered 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 b.u.mblebees could get enough to compensate for their trouble. b.u.t.terflies, 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 b.u.t.terflies 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.