THE VERVAIN FAMILY. 447 



agnus-castus, sending out its sprays of soft white, or lilac, bloom, a most 

 lovely exotic shrub, is a most striking representative as through our range it 

 occurs, having escaped from cultivation. The so-called t>ench mulberry, 

 Callicarpa Americana, a native shrub, is abundant in places throughout the 

 south, and, on account of its highly coloured fruit, very attractive. 



LARQE-FLOWERED VERBENA. 



Verbaia Canadensis. 



Flmuers : growing abundantly in terminal, bracted spikes. Calyx: tuhiilar. 

 pubescent, slender, with five ihread-like teeth, and longer than the bracts. Cor- 

 olla : salver-sliapecl ; the tube long: bearded in the throat, the five lobes notched at 

 the summit. Sldmi-us : four, included. Leaves : ovate or ovate-lanceolate in out- 

 line pointed at the summit, cuneate at the base and tapering into long, margined 

 petioles ; pinnately thrice lobed, the divisions deeply toothed and hairy. Stetn : 

 two to fifteen inches high, ascending, branched, hairy. 



Almost do we regard this verbena as unusual when we find it blossom- 

 ing through the dry soil of pastures, so very accustomed have we become to 

 the hybrids produced from it and the western V. bipinnatifida which now 

 are abundantly seen in cultivation. With its large, showy Mowers, it is of 

 course quite different looking from the well simpler's joy, although the plants 

 are closely related. 



By the ancients the name verbena, we find, was most generally used to 

 designate various plants connected with religious observances; and, there- 

 fore, we can hardly surround these particular inhabitants of the new world 

 with the sacred lore which no doubt their relatives long years ago insti- 

 gated, 



V. Caroliniana is of different personality from that of the large-flowered 

 verbena and has a rather coarse, weedy look. Its small flesh-coloured flowers 

 are clustered in long slender spikes, and the obovate or oblanceolate leaves 

 are simple and nearly sessile. About their margins they are sharply and 

 irregularly serrate. Quite frequently one encounters the plant in old fields 

 about Jacksonville, or through dry barrens as far northward as North Carolina. 



V. angiistifblia, narrow-leaved vervain, occurs from Florida to Mass- 

 achusetts and westward and sends forth a long, linear spike on which are 

 seen many small purple or blue flowers. Its leaves are linear, or spatulate- 

 lanceolate, contracted at the base into short petioles. 



V. hastata, blue vervain or simpler's joy, the common species seen so 

 abundantly through moist meadows and in waste places when the com- 

 posites are in bloom, grows at times as high as seven feet, and is usually 



