76 THE NATURE-STUDY OF PLANTS 
(e) Self-dispersal 
I have chosen the Spurges out of a host of ant- 
dispersed plants because they also belong to a small 
class whose members are very remarkable in another 
way. 
With but comparatively few exceptions there is 
no mechanism in the plant itself for dispersing the 
seeds ; in the Groundsel they are blown away by the 
wind,, in the Brooklime, the Birds-eye and other 
small-seeded, low-growing plants they are washed out 
by the rain, in the Hawthorn they are carried off by 
birds, and in the Beech tree they merely drop to the 
ground, but in the Spurges they are dispersed or put at 
an appreciable distance from the parent plant, in the 
first instance, by the plant itself. 
In order to see how it is done we must watch, and 
we shall find that when they are ripe the small three- 
cornered fruits suddenly explode and scatter the 
three seeds contained in each a short distance. ; 
Now, there are quite a fair number of wild plants 
that shoot their seeds in one way or another. I shall 
however, be dealing pretty fully 
with the Cranesbills later on, 
so I will not spoil the reader’s 
a pleasure in finding out for him- 
A Meee self the exact method adopted 
Fig. 25.—Seed of— by the Wood Violet, the Box, the 
=] tages Viol x4 Cuckoo-flower and the Gorse: all 
of them are quite common and 
well known, although probably the fruits of the Box 
are not so easily accessible as those of the other three. 
In all these dispersal in the first instance is effected 
by the plant itself: we have learnt already that in a 

