OF THE BBACTS. 



243 



is not attributable to arrest of development or retro- 

 grade metamorphosis, but the reverse. The bracts of 

 some species of Plantago^ are very subject to this change. 

 Thus, in the rose plantain of gardens, P. media (fig. 

 126), the bracts are leafy and the axis depressed or 

 not elongated, so that it is surmounted by a rosette of 

 small leafy organs. A similar condition of the bracts, 

 unattended with arrest of growth in the axis, is common 

 in P. Duijcyi' (fig. 127) and in P. lanceolata (see p. 108). 



Fig. 127. Leaf-like bractpS in Plantago major. 



It also occurs in the bracts of Corydalis solida^ Ainorpha 

 fruticosa, Ajuga reptans, Parthenium inodonnn, Cnif- 

 aurea Jacea, in the involucral bracts of the dandelion, tlic 



' See Schlechtendal, ' Bot. Zeit.,' vol. xv, 1857, p. 873; also Marchaud. 

 ' Adanstmia,' iv, p. 156. 



