Wild Flowers Worth Knowing Part 28

_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 ma.s.ses 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 s.h.i.+ps 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 cl.u.s.ter, 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 cl.u.s.tered 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 Ma.s.sachusetts 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.'"

Th.o.r.eau, 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:_ Cl.u.s.tered, 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 coa.r.s.e, hairy, fern-like foliage. At first, these flowers, beloved of b.u.mblebees, 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

_Epif.a.gus 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.