The Ground Ivy bears little resemblance to the ivy we all know so well.
It is common everywhere, and blooms in spring and early summer.
The flowers grow without stalks in whorls or circles close to the stem
where the leaves spring from it. These flowers are dark purply-blue
tubes, prettily divided at the mouth into rounded lips. The lower lips
are marked with white and dark purple blotches. Inside the tubes are
four small stamens with yellow heads; you can just see them at its
mouth, with the forked tip of the seed-vessel among them.
There are usually six or more flowers in a whorl, and each flower has a
green calyx-cup which is very hairy and is edged with five long sharp
teeth.
From each side of the stem, close among the flowers, grow two leaves on
pink stalks. These leaves are round and are beautifully scolloped at the
edge. Each leaf is covered with a network of veins and is hairy all
over, both above and below, as well as round the scollops.
These circles of leaves and flowers grow at intervals all the way up the
stem, with a good distance between each circle, and the flowers in the
lowest circles always come out first.
The stem of the Ground Ivy is four-sided. It is tinged with pink and is
very hairy.