688 Rural School Leaflet. 



plants and animals are thus fitted or adapted, we should be able to see 

 the evidence of it in the first plant or animal that we meet. 



The method is to educate the mind to comprehend what is before it, — 

 to train the pupil to see what he looks at. 



The pupil must first understand what is meant by the " conditions '' 

 under which plants and animals live. There are four main classes of 

 conditions, at least for plants: (i) the climate and seasons; (2) the 

 soil; (3) the mere crowding or contest with each other; (4) the danger 

 from organisms that injure them or feed on them. 



For the present, we may consider some of the ways in which plants 

 adapt themselves to climate and the seasons. It is December. The 

 elms and maples are bare. The leaves are dead, and they have drifted 

 into corners and hollows. The twigs are no longer green and growing. 

 The buds are packed away in dense coverings of close-fitting scales. 

 Last July, all was different. If hard frost had come then, the trees 

 would have been killed. The trees are adapted to the cold? How do 

 you suppose the palm trees and others in the tropics behave? 



Trees are adapted to the winter by ceasing to grow, by reducing their 

 juices to the smallest amount, by casting off the tender organs, and by 

 hardening their parts. They store their food and energies in such form 

 in twig and branch that freezing does not injure. Some trees (which 

 ones?) hold their green leaves, but if we were to examine these leaves 

 minutely we should find that changes have taken place in their cells to 

 enable them to survive the frost. 



Some plants die outright at the approach of winter, and they per- 

 petuate their kind only by means of seeds. Name some of them. Others 

 are carried over the winter b^^ means of .bulbs and tubers; what ones? 



Other plants die to the ground, and only the underground parts sur- 

 vive. Name them. Do the leaves that fall from the trees aid any 

 plants to survive the winter? 



Animals are adapted or related to our climate f i ) by changing their 

 region; (2) by hibernating; (3) by such hardiness of constitution that 

 they endure the cold. Name examples in these classes. 



Adaptation is not always perfect or complete. Very hard winters 

 may kill or injure some of the bushes and trees, .^mong both plants 

 and animals, the least adapted soon perish and the best adapted live and 

 thrive. 



