THE FLOWER 251 



Other common examples of such midtienniaU , ^yhich like 

 annuals die after fruiting, are the American k\oQ (p. 156), the 

 Fan Palm {p. 145), the Malabar Sago Palm (p. 145), and the 

 Bamboo (p. 178). 



2. Storage in Herbs. — We now know how trees lay up a 

 store of food in their stems. There are also many herbs that 

 are able to do it. Annual herbs may lay up some food until 

 they produce seeds at the end of the season, when they consume 

 the whole storage and die. 



Biennials, such as Carrots, store up food in their roots, by 

 which the flowers and fruits of the following year are nourished. 



Perennial herbs, however, do not die at the end of a season 

 or two, but let the parts which are above ground wither during 

 the adverse season to sprout again from their underground parts 

 when the rainy season reappears. These underground stems 

 (rhizomes, bulbs, and tubers) have stores of food in them from 

 which their buds derive their first nourishment when they burst 

 into leaves. 



4. THE FLOWER 



We generally look at the flowers as bright and beautiful 

 objects intended to be a source of pleasure to us; but they are 

 created with a different purpose. Every living thing on this earth 

 meets at one time or another with its des- 

 troyer, Death. To perpetuate its kind 

 or species it is, however, endowed with 

 the power of reproduction. This work 

 is done in plants by their flotvers. They 

 produce seeds, from which, under favour- 

 able conditions, new plants of the same 

 kind spring up. And we shall see that 

 everything about the flower is subser- ^^«- 230.-Shoot3 arising 



. . ., . . from tlie edgres of the leaf of 



vient to this one aim. t. , „ , „• ^ 



Bryophyllura calycinum. 



Many plants are able to propagate 

 themselves also in other ways than by their flowers, as for instance 

 the Hydrocotyle by runners, the Potato by tubers, the Onion by 



