86 ELEMENTS OF BOTANY. 
this? Are the spaces between the edges of the leaves large or small 
compared with the leaves themselves ? 
Pull off a single leaf and make a very careful sketch of its under 
surface, about natural size. Label the broad expanded part the blade, 
and the stalk by which it is attached to the twig, leaf-stalk or petiole. 
Study the outline of the leaf and answer these questions : 
(a) What is the shape of the leaf, taken as a whole? (See Fig. 65.) 
Is the leaf bilaterally symmetrical, i.e., is there a middle line running 
Ve Ae Va VEG 
Fic. 64. — Shapes of Tip of Leaf. 
I, mucronate, the midrib prolonged into a 
hard short point; II, cuspidate, tapering 
into astiff point ; III, acute ; IV, rounded; 1! 
V, acuminate or taper-pointed ; VI, retuse, Fic. 65.—Shapes of Bases of 
with the rounded end slightly notched ; Leaves. 
VII, emarginate, deeply notched; VIII, 1, heart-shaped (unsymmetrically) ; 
truncate, with the end cut off rather 2, arrow-shaped ; 3, halberd- 
squarely. shaped. 
through it lengthwise, along which it could be so folded that the two 
sides would precisely coincide ? 
(b) What is the shape of the tip of the leaf? (See Fig. 64.) 
(c) Shape of the base of the leaf. (See Fig. 65.) 
(d) Outline of the margin of the leaf? (See Fig. 66.) 
cherry, apple. Most of the statements and directions above given would apply to 
any of the leaves just enumerated. If this chapter is reached too early in the season 
to admit of suitable material being procured for the study of leaf arrangement, that 
topic may be omitted until the leaves of forest trees have sufficiently matured. 
i Any form intermediate between III and IV would be called obtuse. 
