THE AMERICAN BOTANIST. 69 



most vivid scarlet flowers in Eastern America, are the cardinal 

 flower {Lobelia cardinaUs) and the bee balm {Monarda didy- 

 iiia). The first when wild is almost invariably found on the 

 l)anks of river or pond rooting in the mud, and the other is 

 fond of wet spots in meadow and pasture. The painted-cup 

 {CastilUa) too, is fond of wet meadows. On the other hand, 

 the red -or fire lily (Liliitm Pluladclphicuin) grows in dry up- 

 land woods far from moisture of anv kind. Our onlv red 

 cinquefoil {Comaniin palustre) is found in deep bogs and so 

 the list runs. Apparently the color in America, at least, is not 

 to be correlated with lack of moisture in the soil. 



Cauliflory. — In temperate regions the flowers are so 

 uniformly borne on the young wood that we come to think of 

 them as restricted to such places and it is something of a sur- 

 prise to find in tropical countries many plants whose flowers 

 and fruits are borne on the trunk instead of the small branches. 

 The cocoa plant from which our cocoa and chocolate come, has 

 this habit and a grove in full fruit looks like a peach orchard 

 with melon-like pods hanging from the trunk and larger 

 branches. Although a tree with its trunk in full bloom is an 

 odd sight to botanists of the temperate zone, the occurrence 

 is not at all mysterious or contrary to plant habits when we 

 come to examine it. As we have stated, the flowers, with us, 

 are borne either on young stems of the year, or on wood that 

 was formed the previous year. The grape is an example of 

 the first and the cherry of the second. In tropical trees that do 

 not require a thick bark to protect the stem, there is no reason 

 why flowers should not occur on the trunk and they are very 

 often found there. They are supposed to be produced by dor- 

 mant buds and are often restricted to the main stem only. In 

 temperate regions, however, we are not entirely devoid of trees 

 which show a tendency to cauliflory, as the phenomenon is call- 

 ed, for the red-bud ( Ccrcis Canadensis) commonly has flow- 

 ers from branches more than two years old. 



