CHAPTER III 

 FLOWERS POLLINATED BY THE WIND 



"Let us have eyes to see 



The new-old miracle; 



If it befell 

 We viewed for the first time such wizardry. 

 Each budding leaf were past belief, 



Ineffable." 



EARLY spring in temperate North America has its own 

 peculiar charm. It is a period of conflict between two 

 seasons, ushered in by shrill winds and rushing waters. 

 Snow and ice still linger in the woods and cold days and frosty 

 nights are common; but warmth and light are continually 

 gaining. Among the many events characteristic of that old but 

 ever new miracle, the resurrection of plant life, the most note- 

 worthy is the bursting into bloom suddenly in early spring of 

 whole forests of deciduous-leaved trees and shrubs before their 

 leaves have appeared. Many of them are familiar species as 

 the alders, birches, poplars, hazels, willows, hornbeams, walnuts, 

 hickories, beeches, elms, oaks, and chestnuts. A part produce 

 edible nuts, and a part are planted as avenue or ornamental 

 trees. Most people never know that they bloom at all. This 

 is partly because the flowers are small and dull-colored, and 

 partly because they come at a season of the year when they 

 are not expected. Why do the flowers expand before the leaves ? 

 A few years ago no one could have answered this question. 



When Louis Agassiz, the famous naturalist and the founder 

 of the Agassiz Museum at Cambridge, and Alexander Braun, 

 who afterward became a distinguished botanist, were school- 



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