[Sidenote: =Youth-on-age=
_Leptáxis Menzièsii. (Tolmiea)_
=Purplish
Summer
Wash., Oreg., Cal.=]
The only kind, a perennial, over a foot tall, with a hairy stem
bearing a graceful wand of small flowers, springing from a cluster
of root-leaves, bright green and thin in texture, but roughish and
sparsely hairy. The flowers are about a third of an inch long, the
calyx, which is the conspicuous part, dark-purple or pinkish-red and
slightly irregular, with three large and two small sepals, and the
petals of the same color, but so narrow that they look like long
curling filaments. The three stamens are opposite the three upper
sepals, the ovary is superior and the capsule has two long beaks.
Young plants often spring from the base of the leaf, where it joins
the leaf-stalk, and this habit gives the common name. This grows in
mountain woods and is attractive, for though the flowers are dull in
color they are unusual in form and the leaves are pretty.
There are a good many kinds of Heuchera, North American, difficult to
distinguish; perennials, with stout rootstocks; leaves mostly from the
root; flowers small, in clusters; calyx-tube bell-shaped, with five
lobes; petals small, sometimes lacking, on the throat of the calyx,
with claws; stamens five, inserted with the petals; ovary partly
inferior, with two slender styles, becoming two beaks on the capsule.
[Sidenote: =Alumroot=
_Heuchèra micrántha_
=Pink and white
Summer
Cal., Oreg., Wash.=]
These feathery sprays are so airy and delicate that they might almost
be made of mingled mist and moonshine, blown from the waterfalls they
love to haunt, but are not so fragile as they look, for the clusters of
tiny pink and white flowers last a long time in water. The stem is very
slender, rather hairy, from one to three feet tall, springing from a
cluster of roundish leaves, prettily lobed and scalloped, bright green,
with some white hairs on the backs and on the long leaf-stems, often
with red veins. The handsome leaves and lovely feathery spires are
conspicuous, decorative and quite common, among mossy rocks in dark,
rich mountain woods, up to six thousand feet.
[Illustration: Alumroot--Heuchera micrantha.