HEDGE-NETTLE.
Stachys bullata, Benth. Mint Family.
Rough, pubescent herbs. Stem.—Ten to eighteen inches high; four- angled. Leaves.—Opposite; ovate or ovate-oblong; cordate; coarsely crenate; wrinkly veined; petioled; an inch or two long. Flowers.—Pinkish; in a narrow, interrupted spike. Calyx.—Five-cleft. Corolla.—Eight lines long; bilabiate. Upper lip erect; lower deflexed, of three unequal lobes, spotted with purple. Stamens.—Four. Filaments hairy. Anthers divergently two-celled. Ovary.—Of four seedlike nutlets. Style filiform. Stigma two-cleft. Hab.—Throughout the State.
The hedge-nettles are common weeds, of which we have several species. S. bullata, so called on account of its leaves, which look as though blistered, is the most widespread. It is quite variable in aspect, and we are constantly meeting it in new guises and being deceived into believing it something finer than it really is, through some subtle change in its usually homely little pink flowers.
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