8. Mocking Bird (Yellow Jasmine

Fig. 24. The scientific name of the mockingbird is Mimus polyglottos. Mimus is latin for "one who mimes," referring to the bird’s mimetic abilities, and polyglottos is greek, meaning "many-tongues" or "harmonious." Thus, the mockingbird is a manytongued mime.

The jasmine, throwing wide her elegant sweets, The deep dark green of whose unvarnish’d leaf Makes more conspicuous, and illumines more, The bright profusion of her scatter’d stars. The Task, Vol. VI

—William Cowper

HooDeD WARBleR, Plate CX

Coral-bean, Dayflower

Erythrina herbacea

Coral-bean can be easily grown and is useful for bringing bright red highlights to woodland plantings in a low-maintenance landscape. Although its use in gardens is not particularly common, it is popular among those who grow it as a source of early season color, and because it makes a showy addition to the perennial garden and attracts both hummingbirds and butterflies. The seed pods, which are almost black, contain brilliant red seeds. Native American people had many medicinal uses for this plant. Creek women used an infusion of the root for bowel pain, and the Choctaw used a decoction of the leaves as a general tonic. The Seminole used an extract of the roots for digestive problems, and extract of the seeds, or of the inner bark, as an external rub for rheumatic disorders. Toxicity is considered low, but seeds are poisonous to humans if eaten.

In this plate, the seedpod shown on the right is coral-bean, the image on the left Audubon referred to as a "dayflower." Audubon dated the original composition for this print August 11, 1821, and noted that he was in Louisiana. The plant he calls a dayflower is a member of the Commelinacae family, a large family of flowering plants, often considered weeds, called dayflowers or spiderworts.

The hooded warbler (Wilsonia citrina) is fairly common in moist woodlands in the Southeast.

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Fig. 25. John James Audubon, Hooded Warbler, 1821, watercolor, graphite, pastel. Collection of the New York Historical Society. Audubon painted the female on August 11, 1821. Joseph Mason painted the flower on the left. The male pictured on the right was added later, and Audubon sketched in, but did not complete, the coral-bean plant. Havell included the sketch in the print and each sheet was hand colored.

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