the scrofularia, presents some interesting 

 peculiarities. The leaves are of a deep 

 green color, the stem square, tinged with 

 purple, and the flowers of a purplish green. 

 It does not possess much beauty to attract 

 the eye, although when separated from its 

 companion plants, it is very graceful, and 

 always presents a damp fresh-like appearance. 

 The scrofularia, as may be supposed, takes 

 its name from the disease so often the pre- 

 cursor of others more fatal, and was at one 

 time used for its cure. The leaves, on being 

 bruised, emit a powerful, cis igreeable odor, 

 a proof that they contain some agent, whe- 

 ther for good or evil. We have seen the 

 leaves used by a medical friend, as a salve 

 in a disease common in colliery districts 

 amongst children. This disease appears in 

 the form of a gathering in the face, much 

 like small pox, but much larger, and when 

 healed, leaves the same unsightly marks as 

 its more fatal brother. The effect of the 

 salve upon a very severe case was both rapid 

 and satisfactory, although we mention it 

 more as an incentive to others to analyze 

 the plant, and ascertain its properties, than 

 to stimulate young practitioners to its im- 

 mediate use. 



A great variety of the plants common to 

 the month of August possess useful or plea- 

 sing properties. There is the common 

 foxglove, without exception the handsomest 

 of our herbaceous wild flowers, with its 

 beautiful stripe of purple or white bells, 

 into which, in our younger or more mis- 

 chievous days, how often have we not 

 watched the bees, and there made them pri- 

 soners, our untutored ear delighted witli the 

 hum of the incarcerated insect. The fox- 

 glove contains a medicine now extensively 

 used for the lowering of the pulse, which 

 is well known as the extract of digitalis. 

 This extract is obtained from the leaves 

 which are gathered just before the flowers 

 burst, and are dried in the dark, so that 

 their colors may be preserved. If the color 

 is lost, the virtue of the plant is destroyed. 



During August and September, every 

 ditch and field contains its specimens of 

 mint, that homely favorite of the cottage 

 garden. There are thirteen species of mint 

 common to this country, all possessing, more 

 or less, that aromatic flavor which renders 

 at least two species useful for culinary or 

 medicinal purposes. These are the spear- 

 mint and the pepper-mint, the latter of 

 which contains an essential oil, found in the 

 minute glands of the leaves and calyx, or 

 flower-cup. Its odor is described as " sweet 

 and mild, without the pungency of the com- 

 mon sort cultivated in gardens." The red 

 bushy mint we have often seen in gardens, 

 where the brightness of its flowers and its 

 agreeable scent render it conspicuous. The 



smell is much increased by cultivating this 

 species in a light dry soil. From the mint 

 to the wild thyme is a natural transition. 

 Who that ever climbed a hill in the month 

 of August hath not rested his limbs on a bed 

 of wild thyme ? And who that hath so done 

 can forget the fragrance of his couch, the 

 purple flowers, the perfume which every 

 blast " wafts to the charmed sense ?" The 

 imagination of even a Shakspeare could not 

 have fancied a more fitting bed for the Fairy 

 Queen. Botanists at one time named three 

 species of wild thyme, but modern science 

 has placed two of them under different 

 genera, the acinos and calamintha — the 

 basil thyme and the calamint. Even an un- 

 cultivated eye would certainly keep them 

 away from the thyme, the chief resemblance 

 being in the shape of the flowers and the 

 aromatic smell; the differences are too 

 obvious to be mistaken. The calamint is 

 employed to make an herb-tea, as it is 

 called in rural districts, and, like many other 

 of our wild flowers may contain a principle 

 equal to that of the China plant. 



The germander, or wood sage, is a wild 

 flower belonging to the same class as the 

 thyme and marjoram. It is not very inviting 

 in its appearance, the flowers being neither 

 green, yellow, nor white, but apparently a 

 mixture of the whole. The germander grows 

 about a foot high, amongst stones, and in dry 

 woody places, and is easily noticed by its 

 wrinkled leaves, purple stem, and the peculiar 

 tinge of the blossoms. The plant yields a 

 powerful, and not very agreeable bitter, which 

 has been sometimes used in brewing, as a 

 substitute for hops. Flowering at the same 

 season, and belonging to the same family of 

 plants as those first noticed, we might point 

 out an infinite variety, well worthy attention 

 Here is the horehound, the mother-wort, the 

 dead-nettle, one of which never ceases 

 flowering from January to January ; the 

 prunella, or self-heal, the wound-wort, and 

 the beautiful euphrasite, or eye-bright, which 

 grows prostrate on the ground, with a stem 

 scarcely an inch long, and delicate light pink- 

 streaked flowers, with a dark purple eye. 

 This plant is used occasionally, hi rural 

 practice, for diseases of the eye. Milton, 

 in his " Paradise Lost," after the fall, and 

 when the Archangel Michael is about to 

 show our first parent the effects of his dis- 

 obedience, in the future history of man, 

 introduces the eye-bright as the plant used 

 by the archangel to remove the film from the 

 eye of Adam : — 



" Then purged with euphrasy and rue 

 The visual nerve, for he had much to see." 



There is no plant more engaging than the 

 eye-bright, and a singularity about it is, that 

 although in the rich meadows of England 

 it rarely attains above an inch in height, 



