248 CONVOLVULACE^ 



leaf and the size of the flower, some notion of the way in which the tropical 

 Convolvuli adorn the tops of the highest trees." 



2. Seaside Convolvulus (C. soldandla). — Leaves kidney-shaped, 

 slightly angular, fleshy ; stalks 1-flowered, with 4 membranous angles ; bracts 

 egg-shaped, close to the flowers ; perennial. This is one of the many in- 

 teresting ornaments of our sandy shores ; where, though we may sometimes 

 wander for miles without seeing it, it is in some places very abundant, and is 

 always an exceedingly pretty plant. On the sandhills about Sandwich, and 

 among pebbles on the shore at New Eomney, in Kent, it is plentiful ; as it 

 is also common on the sandy shores of the western counties of England. 



The flowers of this species are rose-coloured, and very conspicuous, 

 expanding from June to September, The seed-vessel is remarkably large, 

 sometimes even as large as a hazel-nut, and the seeds themselves scarcely 

 smaller than peas. The Soldanella groAvs not only on hills and banks of sand, 

 but also in crevices of rocks or on cliffs. Mr. Thompson, referring to its 

 growth in Wales, says : " It is one of the productions claimed by the grey- 

 wacke formation of the Penmaenmawr mountains, and denied to the limestone 

 of Orme's Head. It is true that a few specimens may be encountered near 

 Llandudno, but they are seldom seen in a flowering state, and I have never 

 found one seed-vessel of that species on the shore opposite the town of Con- 

 way, although familiar to me from frequent search. The plant, however, 

 flowers and produces seed in great abundance on the level tract of shore 

 subtending the cliffs of Penmaenbach." The flowers of this species close 

 during night and rainy weather. They are often almost all that can be seen 

 of the plant, as the leaves are nearly buried in the sand, the stem rarely 

 taking to twining as in the other species. 



3. Dodder {Ouscuta). 



]. Greater Dodder (C. europcea). — Heads of flowers dense and sessile, 

 with bracts, styles not protruding beyond the mouth of corolla ; tube of the 

 corolla longer than the calyx ; scales pressed close to the tube ; annual. 

 This is a less frequent kind of Dodder than that which so commonly winds 

 about our furze bushes. It is, like all the species, without leaves, and has 

 very long twining stems, covered with small tubercles, which serve as roots ; 

 and in July and August the little clusters of pale-yellowish rose-coloured 

 flowers expand. The plant is, however, rather local than rare, abounding in 

 Cambridgeshire, Huntingdonshire, and some other counties, entwining thistles, 

 nettles, hops, beans, and some other plants. Unlike other strictly parasitic 

 plants, the seeds of the Dodder germinate at first in common soil, though if 

 the seedlings be kept there they very soon perish. When in the neighbour- 

 hood of vegetation suited to their growth, they twine about it, sending their 

 coils from left to right, contrary to the sun's apparent course. After they 

 have well inserted their aerial roots within the substance of the neighbouring 

 plants, the original root, from which they derived their earliest nutriment, 

 dies, leaving them to feed on the juices of the adopted vegetable. A writer 

 in Loudon's Magazine of Natural Histcrry, says of the Greater Dodder : 

 *' This parasite can be established wherever the hop plant grows, by placing, 

 in the autumn, a wreath of the Dodder-vine, bearing ripe capsules, on the 



