LABIATAE 
135 
LABIATAE. MINT FAMILY 
Aromatic herbs or low shrubs with square stems and opposite leaves. 
Calyx synsepalous, usually 5-toothed. Corolla 2-lipped, usually with 2 
lobes in the upper lip and 3 in the lower. Stamens 4, in two pairs, or 
the upper pair wanting. Ovary superior, 4-lobed, splitting when ripe 
into 4 seed-like nutlets.—About 2,800 species distributed over the whole 
earth. Nearly all species have an aromatic odor due to the secretion of 
a volatile oil which has the characteristic taste of peppermint. 
A. Flowers solitary in the axils; stamens 4 
Calyx with entire lips, a crest on the upper side.2. Scutellaria. 
Calyx not crested on upper side. 
Trailing herb; flowers small.8. Micromeria. 
Shrub ; flowers large..9. Sphacele. 
B. Flowers in clusters, often crowded in the axils of the opposite 
leaves and having the appearance of a whorl 
Stamens conspicuously long-exserted and curved.1. Trichostema. 
Stamens moderately exserted or included. 
Corolla little irregular. 
Flowers in axillary whorls.11. Mentha. 
Flowers in terminal bracted heads; segments of the corolla narrow and 
very similar.....10. Monardella. 
Corolla plainly 2-lipped. 
Calyx regular ; flowers in whorls. 
Calyx-teeth 10, slender, hooked at tip; stamens included in corolla- 
tube....3. Marrubium. 
Calyx-teeth 5, triangular, cuspidate; stamens projecting beyond 
corolla-tube which has a hairy rim within.5. Stachys. 
Calyx 2-lipped or its teeth unequal. 
Stamens 4 (or 2). 
Flowers in a dense terminal spike with roundish bracts ; upper 
calyx-lip truncate with 3 cusps on the margins. 
4. Brunella. 
Flowers in whorls, the whorls in a spike; upper calyx-lip 
3-toothed.7. Pogogyne. 
Stamens 2, the upper pair of stamens none or rudimentary; flowers 
in whorls or a panicle...6. Salvia. 
1. TRICHOSTEMA L. Blue Curls 
L eaves entire. Flowers blue in axillary cymes or becoming raceme¬ 
like in age. Calyx almost equally 5-cleft. Corolla with oblique limb, 
the oblong lobes nearly alike, the tube long, slender, abruptly curved into 
an arc of a circle just below the limb. Filaments hair-like, curved out¬ 
ward and downward and very much exserted. (Greek trichos, hair, and 
stern on, stamen.) 
Shrubby; leaves revolute; herbage sweet, aromatic.1. T. lanatum. 
Annuals, 2.8 dm. high or less; leaves plane; herbage ill-scented. 
Stems very leafy; flower clusters nearly sessile.2. T. lanceolatum. 
Stems sparsely leafy; flower clusters peduncled.3. T. laxum. 
1. T. lanatum Benth. Romero. About 8.5 to 11.5 dm. high; leaves 
numerous, narrowly linear, green and glabrous above, white-woolly be¬ 
neath ; flowers numerous in a virgate spike which is densely purple-woolly 
even to the calyx and (2.4 cm. long) corolla.—S. Cal. The herbage is 
used by Spanish-Californians as a remedy for ulcers and inflammations 
of the skin. 
