Certainly its
adaptation is quite as perfect as the salvia's. Mischievous bees
and wasps steal nectar they cannot reach legitimately through
bungholes of their own making in the bottom of the slender casks.
"This species," says Mr. Ellwanger, "is said to give a decoction
but little inferior to the true tea, and was largely used as a
substitute" by the Indians and the colonists, who learned from
them how to brew it.
SCARLET PAINTED CUP; INDIAN PAINT-BRUSH
(Castilleja coccinea) Figwort family
Flowers - Greenish yellow, enclosed by broad, vermilion, 3-cleft
floral bracts; borne in a terminal spike. Calyx flattened,
tubular, cleft above and below into 2 lobes; usually green,
sometimes scarlet; corolla very irregular, the upper lip long and
arched, the short lower lip 3-lobed; 4 unequal stamens; pistil.
Stem: 1 to 2 ft. high, usually unbranched, hairy. Leaves: Lower
ones tufted, oblong, mostly uncut; stem leaves deeply cleft into
3 to 5 segments, sessile.
Preferred Habitat - Meadows; prairies; moist, sandy soil;
thickets.
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