This section is from the book "Harper's Guide To Wild Flowers", by Caroline A. Creevey. Also available from Amazon: Harper's Guide To Wild Flowers.
(diminutive of mimus, a buffoon, from the "grinning corolla")
Family, Figwort. Color, lilac. Calyx, with 5 angles and teeth. Corolla, tubular, 2-lipped, upper lip
2-lobed, lower 3-divided; of the snapdragon order, slightly open
The flowers grow near the upper part of the stem, in the leaf-axils hanging from long, slender peduncles. The stem is sharply 4-angled, 2 or 3 feet high, smooth. Leaves, opposite, meeting and clasping the stem, long and narrow or oblong, pointed, toothed. July to September.
Wet grounds, banks of streams, etc. In all the Eastern States. (See illustration, p. 349.)
Monkey Flower (Mimulus ringens)
Color, lilac. Often growing beside the last species is the winged monkey flower, having a sharply angled or winged stem, petioled leaves, and flowers on shorter peduncles.
In the same delicate shade of lilac and in general habit, the two species resemble each other.
 
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