Red and Indefinites 



butterflies, which suck with their wings in motion, may be rarely 

 caught robbing the short tubes. Among the wild flowers, only 

 the columbine, with an almost parallel blooming season, rivals the 

 painted cup for the bird's beneficent attentions. The latter 

 flowers at about the time the ruby-throat flashes northward out 

 of the tropics to spend the summer. Professor Robertson of 

 Illinois says, " In 1886 the first humming bird seen was on May 

 5, visiting the Castilleja." (Illustration, p. 392.) 



Wood Betony; Lousewort; Beefsteak Plant; 

 High Heal-all 



(Pedicularis Canadensis) Figwort family 



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 ^ in. long, 2-lipped, the 

 upper lip arched, concave, the lower ^-lobed ; 4 stamens in 

 pairs ; I pistil. Stems: Clustered, 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, Belonica 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 coarse, 

 hairy, fern-like foliage. At first, these flowers, beloved of bumble- 

 bees, 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 bet- 

 ony's repellent name. 



388 



