174 I'lNK TO RED 



WOOD BETONY 



Pediciilaris bracteosa. Figwort Family 



Stems: stout, high, erect, simple. Leaves: linear in outline, the radical 

 ones petioled, pinnate, the oblong leaflets pinnately parted, the segments 

 incisely dentate, cauline broader in outline; bracts ovate, shorter than 

 the flowers. Flowers: spike cylindrical, very dense; calyx sparsely pil- 

 lose ; corolla ochroleucous, the tube equalling the calyx ; galea longer 

 and larger than the lower lip, its cucullate summit slightly produced at 

 the entire edentulate orifice, but not beaked. 



A tall coarse plant, with handsome, green, fern-like foliage, 

 but clumsy uninteresting flowers. On the top of the stout 

 reddish stems grow large, hairy, bracted spikes, with many 

 small dull red flowers, which resemble a parrot's beak, with 

 their raised hooded upper lips and small lower ones. These 

 flowers are subtended by conspicuous bracts, hence the name 

 bracteosa. 



The Romans had a proverb, " Sell your coat and buy 

 Betony," and another old saying was, " May you have more 

 virtues than Betony." Antoninus Musa, physician to the 

 Emperor Augustus, wrote in high praise of its powers, stat- 

 ing that it would cure forty-seven of the ills to which human 

 flesh is heir. 



Franzins, in his History of Brutes^ alludes to its healing 

 virtues for animals. He says of the stag, "■ When he is 

 wounded with a dart, the only cure he hath is to eate some 

 of the herbe called Betony, which helpeth both to draw out 

 the dart and to heale the wound." 



Sir William Hooker is our authority for saying that the 

 common name is a corruption of Bcntonic, ben meaning 

 "head," and ton '* good " or *' tonic." 



