HARPER'S GUIDE TO WILD FLOWERS 



The small flowers are arranged in terminal, close spikes 

 with the colored bracts interspersed. The whole plant 

 fragrant and with a pleasant taste. 



Dry fields and roadsides, New England to Pennsylvania. 



Mountain Mint. Basil 



Fycnanthemum virginianum. — Family, Mint. Color, whitish or 

 light purple, dotted with darker purple. Leaves, long, narrow, 

 nearly sessile, clustered thickly in the axils; those nearest the 

 flowers whitish, with a soft down. July and August. 



There are several species of mountain mint, found oftener 

 below the hills than upon them. Most of them have small 

 flowers with a 5 -toothed calyx and 2 -lipped corolla crowded 

 in button-like heads, downy, whorled around the stem and 

 terminal in close cymes. With the heads are short, stiff, 

 pointed bracts. It is not easy always to distinguish the 

 species. (See illustration, p. 343O 



P, ftexudsum often grows with the last. Color, purple. Leaves, 

 linear, firm. Calyx-teeth, awn-pointed. Heads of flowers ter- 

 minating the branches. 



Dry ground throughout the Atlantic States. 



P. muticum has broader leaves than the last, with rounded or 

 heart-shaped bases, and few, rather large heads of purplish 

 flowers in dense clusters, corymbose. Whole plant downy. 



New Hampshire to Missouri and southward. 



P, Torrei. — Color, purple. Heads of flowers, roundish, ter- 

 minal, dense. Green throughout, and not, like the last, whitish. 

 Leaves, thin, petioled, long, narrow, pointed at both ends. 



Dry soil, fields and woods, New York to Georgia. 



P. incanum. — Color, purple. Flowers, in large, open cymes or 

 loose clusters, terminal and in the upper axils. Leaves, ovate, 

 those above covered with whitish down on both sides, with short 

 petioles, broadly toothed. 



Open woods and dry hills, Virginia to Georgia. All these 

 species of the mountain mint grow in dry soil, in fields or 

 woods, and are common in the Atlantic States, north and south. 



Creeping Thyme 



Thymus Serpyttum. — Family, Mint. Color, purplish. Leaves, 

 very small, ovate, with fringing hairs at the base. Flowers, in 



342 



