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Roots: Large, thick, fragrant. Leaves:
Compounded of heart-shaped, sharply tapering, saw-edged leaflets
from 2 to 5 in. long, often downy underneath. Lower leaves often
enormous. Fruit: Dark reddish-brown berries.
Preferred Habitat - Rich open woods, wayside thickets, light
soil.
Flowering Season - July-August.
Distribution - New Brunswick to Georgia, west to the Mississippi.
A striking, decorative plant, once much sought after for its
medicinal virtues - still another herb with which old women
delight to dose their victims for any malady from a cold to a
carbuncle. Quite a different plant, but a relative, is the one
with hairy, spike-like shoots from its fragrant roots, from which
the "very precious" ointment poured by Mary upon the Saviour's
head was made. The nard, an Indian product from that plant, which
is still found growing on the distant Himalayas, could then be
imported into Palestine only by the rich.
The wild spikenard, or false Solomon's seal, has not the remotest
connection with this tribe of plants.


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