YERBA BUENA.
Micromeria Douglasii, Benth. Mint Family.
Aromatic trailing vines. Stems.—Slender; one to four feet long. Leaves.—One inch long; round-ovate. Flowers.—Solitary; axillary; white or purplish. Calyx.—Five-toothed; two lines long. Corolla.—Five lines long; bilabiate. Stamens.—Four; in pairs on the corolla. Ovary.—Of four seedlike nutlets. Style filiform. Stigma unevenly two-lipped. Hab.—Vancouver Island to Los Angeles County.
The yerba buena is as dear to the Californian as the Mayflower to the New Englander, and is as intimately associated with the early traditions of this Western land as is that delicate blossom with the stormy past of the Pilgrim Fathers. Its delicious, aromatic perfume seems in some subtle way to link those early days of the Padres with our own, and to call up visions of the long, low, rambling mission buildings of adobe, with their picturesque red-tiled roofs; the flocks and herds tended by gentle shepherds in cowls; and the angelus sounding from those quaint belfries, and vibrating in ever-widening circles over hill and vale.
Before the coming of the Mission Fathers, the Indians used this little herb, placing great faith in its medicinal virtues, so that the Padres afterward bestowed upon it the name of "yerba buena"—"the good herb." It is still used among our Spanish-Californians in the form of a tea, both as a pleasant beverage and as a febrifuge, and also as a remedy for indigestion and other disorders.
They designate this as "Yerba Buena del Campo"—i.e. the wild or field yerba buena,—to distinguish it from the "Yerba Buena del Poso"—"the herb of the well,"—which is the common garden-mint growing in damp places.
Aside from its associations and medicinal virtues, this is a charming little plant. In half-shaded woods its long, graceful stems make a trailing interlacement upon the ground and yield up their minty fragrance as we pass.
![[YERBA BUENA—Micromeria Douglasii.]](#3624944100741987669_f021.png.id-3228396931731409057.wrap-0.html.html){kind=link}