[Illustration]
[Sidenote: =Phacelia=
_Phacèlia grandiflòra_
=Lilac
Summer
California=]
A very handsome kind, though rather coarse, and hairy and sticky all
over, but with lovely, delicate flowers. The stems are from one to
three feet tall and the dark green leaves are velvety on the upper side
and hairy on the under. The flowers often measure two inches across,
with a lilac or mauve corolla, shading to white in the center, flecked
and streaked with brown, blue, or purple, and the stamens have purple
filaments and pale yellow anthers. This plant is unpleasantly sticky,
with a viscid fluid which stains everything with which it comes in
contact, is poisonous to some people, and is found from Santa Barbara
to San Diego.
[Sidenote: _Phacèlia víscida var. albiflòra_
=White
Spring
California=]
This is a white variety, with pretty, delicate white flowers. _Phacelia
viscida_ is very much like _P. grandiflora_, and has about the same
range, but is not so large a plant, usually about a foot tall, with
smaller flowers, about an inch across. The corollas are blue, with
purple or white centers.
[Sidenote: =Wild Canterbury-bell=
_Phacèlia Whitlàvia_
=Purple
Summer
California=]
Charming flowers, though the foliage is rather too hairy. The stout,
reddish stems are hairy, brittle, and loosely branching, about a foot
tall, and the leaves dull green and hairy. The handsome flowers are in
graceful nodding clusters, with a bell-shaped corolla, about an inch
long, a rich shade of bluish-purple, the long conspicuous stamens and
pistils giving an airy look to the blossoms. The filaments are purple
and the anthers almost white and, as in other Phacelias, when the
corolla drops off the long forked style remains sticking out of the
calyx like a thread. This grows in light shade in rich moist soil in
the hills.
[Illustration]
[Illustration: Phacelia grandiflora.]
[Illustration: Wild Canterbury-bell--P. Whitlavia.