Page:Wayside and Woodland Blossoms.djvu/112

51 stigmas ripen before the anthers; in the smaller the anthers mature before the stigmas. The tubular calyx is divided into four sharp lobes. The corolla is white, streaked with purple, except the central lobe of the lower lip, which is yellow. This is the only native species of the genus which is comprised in the order Scrophularineæ though there are several varietal forms. Flowers from May to September. The name is from the Greek, Euphraino to delight or gladden, in allusion to the pleasing contrast of its bright flowers with the dark foliage, or from its supposed efficacy for complaints affecting the eyes its removal of these giving gladness.

The plant is—at least partially—a parasite, and preys upon the roots of other plants, which it robs. Probably the lowly forms to which we have referred may be less parasitic than those of greater stature; for if the seeds are sown in pots by themselves they will germinate and grow, but will never get large robust plants.

Of late years it has become the general error to call this plant Bulrush, a name which belongs by right to Scirpus lacustris. Every autumn the hawkers in London and other cities offer the cylindrical spikes of Typha for sale as aesthetic decorations, and call them bulrushes; but they are not the originators of the blunder. It is the artists who have done this thing, especially one Delaroche, whose picture of "The Finding of Moses" is of world-wide popularity. In that painting he depicted the future leader of his people rocking in his ark amid a forest of Typha. What more was needed to associate the word bulrush of the Bible (itself a blunder of the learned translators) with this plant?

There are two British species, perennial plants with long, narrow, grass-like leaves, the bases of which sheath the stem.