38 



MORPHOLOGY OF STEMS AND BRANCHES. [LESSON 6. 



and the Gooseberry naturally multiply in this way, as well as by 

 suckers (which we see are just the same thing, only the connecting 

 part is concealed under ground). They must have suggested the 

 operation of layering, or bending down and covering with earth 

 branches which do not naturally make stolons ; and after they have 

 taken root, as they almost always will, the gardener cuts through 

 the connecting stem, and so converts a rooting branch into a sepa- 

 rate plant. 



90. Offsets, like those of the Houseleek, are only short stolons, 

 with a crown of leaves at the end. 



91. Fi Uliliers, of which the Strawberry presents the most familiar 

 example, are a long and slender, tendril-like, leafless form of creep- 

 ing branches. Each runner, after having grown to its full length, 

 strikes root from the tip, and fixes it to the ground, then forms a bud 

 there, which develops into a tuft of leaves, and so gives rise to a new 

 plant, which sends out new runners to act in the same way. In this 

 manner a single Strawberry plant will spread over a large space, or 

 produce a great number of plants, in the course of the summer ; all 

 connected at first by the slender runners ; but these die in the 

 following winter, if not before, and leave the plants as so many 

 separate individuals. 



92. Tendrils are branches of a very slender sort, like runners, not 

 destined like them for propagation, and therefore always destitute 



63 



of buds or leaves, but intended for climbing. Those of the Grape- 

 Vine, of the Virginia Creeper (Fig. 62), and of the Cucumber and 



FIG. C2. Piece of the stem of Virginia Creeper, bearing a leaf and a tendril. 63. Tips 

 of a tendril, about the natural size, showing the disks by which tiiey hold fast to walls, &c. 



