358 LABIATE. (MINT FAMILY.) 



29. STACHYS, L. HEDGE-NETTLE. 



Calyx tubular-bell-shaped, 5-10-nerved, equally 5-toothed, or the upper teeth 

 united to form an upper lip. Corolla not dilated at the throat ; the upper lip 

 erect or rather spreading, often arched, entire or nearly so ; the lower usually 

 longer and spreading, 3-lobed, with the middle lobe largest and nearly entire. 

 Stamens 4, ascending under the upper lip (often reflexed on the throat after 

 flowering) : anthers approximate in pairs. Nutlets obtuse, not truncate. 

 Whorls 2 - many-flowered, approximate in a terminal raceme or spike (whence 

 the name, from crra^us, a spike). Flowering in summer. 

 * Root annual: stems decumbent, low. 



1. S. ARVENSIS, L. (WOUND WORT.) Hairy; leaves petioled, ovate, obtuse, 

 crenate, heart-shaped at the base ; axillary whorls 4 - 6-flowered, distant ; corolla 

 (purplish) scarcely longer than the soon declined unarmed calyx. : Waste 

 places, E. Massachusetts : scarce. (Adv. from Eu.) 



* * Root perennial : stem erect. 



2. S. pallistris, L. Stem 4-angled (2 -3 high), leafy, hirsute with 

 spreading or reflexed hairs, especially on the angles ; leaves sessile, or the lower 

 short-petioled, oblong- or ovate-lanceolate, crenately serrate, rounded or heart- 

 shaped at the base, downy or hairy-pubescent, obtusish (2' -4' long), the upper 

 floral ones shorter than the nearly sessile calyx ; whorls 6 - 10-flowered, the up- 

 per crowded into an interrupted spike ; calyx hispid ; the lance-subulate teeth 

 somewhat spiny, half the length of the purple corolla, diverging in fruit. Wet 

 banks of streams, &c., mostly northward. (Eu.) To this, for the present, we 

 must refer all the following as varieties, different as some of them are : 



Var. aspera. (S. aspera, Michx.) Stem more commonly smooth on the 

 sides, the angles beset with stiff reflexed bristles ; leaves hairy or smoothish, 

 pointed, the lower petioled, the lower floral as long as the flowers ; spike often 

 slender and more interrupted ; calyx-tube rather narrower and the teeth more 

 awl-shaped and spiny. Common in wet grounds. This passes into 



Var. glabra. (S. glabra, Riddell, suppl. cat. Ohio pi. 1836.) More slender, 

 smooth and glabrous throughout, or with few bristly hairs ; leaves oblong- or ovate- 

 lanceolate, taper-pointed, more sharply toothed, mostly rounded or truncate at 

 the base, a/,1 petioled. W. New York to Michigan and south westward. 



Var. cor data. (S. cordata, Riddell, L c. S. Nuttallii, Shuttlew.) Stem 

 beset with spreading or reflexed bristly hairs ; leaves hairy or smoothish, oblong, 

 heart-shaped at the narrowed base, all more or less petioled ; calyx-teeth sometimes 

 shorter. Common westward and southward. 



3. S. hyssopifblia, Michx. Smooth and glabrous, or nearly so ; stems 

 slender (1 high), the angles sometimes reflexed-bristly ; leaves linear-oblong, or 

 narrowly linear, sessile, obscurely toothed towards the apex ; whorls 4 - 6-flowered, 

 rather distant ; corolla (light purple) twice or thrice the length of the triangular- 

 awl-shaped spreading calyx-teeth. Wet sandy places, Massachusetts to Vir- 

 ginia ; also Michigan, Illinois and southward. 



BETONICA OFFICINALIS, the WOOD BETONT of Europe, of a genus hardly 

 distinct from Stachys, was found by C. J. Sprague in a thicket at Newton, 

 Massachusetts. 



