Minnesota Plant Life. 



371 



way of disting-uishing the two varieties is by the calyx which 

 in both is five-notched, but in the appendaged waterleaf a 

 little scale grows out of each of the calyx notches, while this 

 scale is absent in the Virginia waterleaf. 



The Ellisia is an herb, four inches or so in height, with leaves 

 a couple of inches long, deeply pinnately-lobed, shaped some- 

 what like those of the shepherd's-purse. The flowers are borne 

 singly on their stems, and are white and bell-shaped. In fruit 

 the calyx enlarges and looks like a small paper star, in the 

 middle of which the globular capsule is attached. The two 

 Phacclias, both very rare plants in Minnesota, have leaves some- 

 what like those of the Ellisia, but with purple or blue flowers 

 in clusters. One sort has them in terminal racemes, on both 

 sides of which the flowers are borne. In the other kind the 

 flowers are all grouped on one side of the raceme. 



Borages. The borage family includes the comfreys, false 

 gromwells, puccoons. lungworts, forget-me-nots, stickseeds, 

 hound's-tongues and mudworts. Several of the varieties are 

 introduced from Europe. There are, in all, about twenty-five 

 varieties growing wild within the limits of the state. Borage 

 flowers, in outward appearance, are a good deal like those of 

 the phlox, though often very much smaller. The stamens are 

 borne upon the tube of the corolla and the fruit-rudiment, made 

 up of two carpels, is deeply grooved, so that when the fruit 

 matures it has the appearance of four one-seeded nutlets stand- 

 ing close together within the calyx. The leaves are generally 

 alternate. The stems are rarely square, but in almost every in- 

 stance cylindrical. The whole plant-body is commonly hairy, 

 sometimes very much so. Plants with the sort of tubular, flaring- 

 topped flowers, found in the sweet-william, and accustomed 

 to ripen four little hard nutlets from each flower, may pretty 

 safely be put down as borages, unless their stems are square, 

 in which instance they should be looked for in the mint family. 



Hound's-tongues. The hound's-tongue is a weed of waste 

 places and woods, with stems from one to three feet in height. 

 The flowers are blue or reddish-purple and occur in somewhat 

 flat-topped clusters. Another sort of hound's-tongue, with 

 much slenderer, almost willow-shaped leaves, is an immigrant 

 from Europe. Its flowers are arranged, in most instances, in 



