io FLOWERS OF THE FIELDS AND MEADOWS 



type of Crowfoot or Buttercup in flower, and especially in foliage and 

 habit, differs in having- only one cotyledon, which may be regarded as 

 due to its geophilous habit, that is to say, the green parts live above 

 ground for only part of the year. Thus it is propagated by small 

 tubers, which give it its name, and it would appear according to one 

 view to be a Dicotyledon which has suppressed its other cotyledon or 

 seed-leaf owing to the fact that its habitat was once more aquatic. It 

 will be found down in the damp hollows of clayey ash woods, or 

 in moist open meadows and fields, and under hedges carpeting the 

 bank to the exclusion of all else. In fact, on a lawn it is a great 

 exterminator of grass. 



The Lesser Celandine has a loose rosette habit. The plant is 

 without hairs. The root-fibres are stout, cylindric, or tufted tubers, 

 which are thick, club-shaped, fleshy. The stem is prostrate, short, 

 branched below, weak, sometimes with bulbs or corms in the axils, in 

 which case the plant does not flower but reproduces by the corms. 

 The stem is one-flowered, with 1-3 leaves. The leaves are chiefly 

 radical, heart-shaped, thick, smooth, shining, dark green, angular, the 

 angles blunt, or the margin may be wavy or scalloped. The leaves 

 are stalked, the leaf-stalk stout and thickened below. 



In the typical form the lobes of the lower leaves are separate at the 

 base, not overlapping. The lowest sheaths are narrow. The stomata 

 are on the upper surface of the leaves as in aquatic plants with floating 

 leaves, and this species may once have been aquatic. 



The flowers are large, shining yellow golden, about an inch in 

 diameter. The petals may be absent. The flower-stalks are in the 

 axils, stout, with one or two leaves. The petals are usually eight in 

 number, but vary considerably in number up to sixteen, and in form, 

 being often much reduced. There are three sepals as a rule. The 

 achenes form a round head and are smooth, blunt, large. Seed is not 

 always set, the plant reproducing vegetatively. The style is very small. 

 The cotyledon is single as in Monocotyledons, which may result from 

 suppression of the second, or be a primitive character. Since the 

 plant is a geophyte and adapted to aquatic conditions, as a large 

 proportion of the Monocotyledons also are, the order Ranunculaceae 

 may be regarded as closely allied to the Monocotyledons. 



The Lesser Celandine grows 6 in. high, flowers from March to 

 May, and is perennial. 



The mode of pollination in the Lesser Celandine is not dissimilar 

 on the whole to that in the common Meadow Crowfoots. The anthers 

 ripen before the stigma. The number of the stamens is variable, as in 



