108 
In summer, while hunting berries or wild flowers by 
the stream that runs through the pasture, you have 
noticed that certain plants seemed to be caught in a 
tangle of golden threads. If you stopped to look at 
this tangle, you found little clusters of white flowers 
scattered along the thread-like stems (Fig. 118); then, 
to your surprise, you discovered that nowhere was this 
odd-looking stem fastened 
to the ground. 
It began and ended high 
above the earth, among the 
plants which crowded along 
the brook’s edge. 
Perhaps you broke off 
one of these plants about 
which the golden threads 
were twining. If so, you 
found that these threads were fastened firmly to the 
plant by means of little roots which grew into its stem, 
just as ordinary roots grow into the earth. 
This strange plant is called the ‘‘dodder.” When it 
was still a baby plant, it lay within its seed upon the 
ground, just like other baby plants; and when it burst 
its seed shell, like other plants it sent its roots down 
into the earth. 
But unlike any other plant I know of, it did not send 
up into the air any seed leaves. The dodder never 
bears a leaf. 
It sent upward a slender golden stem. Soon the 
stem began to sweep slowly through the air in circles, 
as if searching for something. Its movements were 
