17Q PRINCIPLES OF GARDENING. [CH. V. 



by cuttings, and eacli plant put forth annually 

 shoots of surpassing luxuriance ; but no flower had 

 ever been produced : accidentally one plant was left 

 for a season in the dry stove at Kew, and this plant 

 had only a moderately luxmiant foliage, but a flower 

 was produced at the extremity oi every shoot. It 

 now blooms every season in our stoves, a drier and 

 less fertilizing course of treatment being adopted. 



Those who ridicule the idea of the leaf, the flower, 

 and the fruit being only different developements of 

 the same parts, which take different forms as the ne- 

 cessities of the plant render them desirable, surely 

 forget that the leaf naturally takes such vaiying 

 shapes, as in many instances to have more the ap- 

 pearance of fruit than of that usually assumed by 

 foliage. Of this number are many of our fleshy- 

 leaved plants ; and the tubular vessel at the ex- 

 tremity of the leaf of the Nepenthes distillatoria . In 

 the calyx of the strawbeny-spinach, (i^Z/ttwi,) and in 

 that of the mulberry, the transformation is still more 

 complete ; for here it actually changes colour when 

 the flowering is over, becoming the edible part of the 

 fruit, and inclosing the seed like a genuine berry. 



The difference of colour usually existing between 

 leaves and petals is a veiy unsubstantial distinction. 

 Many flowers are altogether green ; many leaves are 

 brilliantly coloured, as those of melampyiiim, ama- 

 ranthus, begonia, &c. Then again, gi'een leaves be- 

 come vellow, red, and bro\\ii, in autiunn ; and M. 



