42 ODD HOURS WITH NATURE 



work before the crowd has assembled, and these 

 are the flowers of spring. The snowdrops have 

 found it difficult to compete even with the flowers 

 of spring, and have pushed back to the very gates 

 of winter, where they find themselves without com- 

 petitors for such sunshine as is and for the 

 attention of such insects as are then abroad. 



From action of this struggle -evading character 

 it is not necessary to infer a general all-round 

 weakness on the part of the evading organism. 

 A single defect of quality might suffice as the 

 determinant, and there must be powers of adapta- 

 tion of other kinds if the evasion is to be a success. 

 The American expression, " Get out or get on," 

 describes the case. The bulb plants of spring 

 have got out and got on, and their device of the 

 bulb is the secret of their success. They flower 

 early and scatter their seed, but after getting these 

 vital functions done they use the heat of early 

 summer to store up, by means of roots and leaves, 

 food supplies which enable them to rush through 

 with the vital processes at a time in the following 

 year when without their store they would be lost. 

 They have also furnished themselves with means 

 of resistance to cold, and it is a curious fact that 

 the air within the drooping bell of the snowdrop 

 is always two or three degrees higher in tempera- 

 ture than the air without. This is a matter of 

 importance, for in time of frost the organs of the 

 flower are always the first to suffer, and when 

 the anthers are frost-bitten the flower containing 

 them produces no seed. But bulb plants, with 

 their power of budding from the bulb, are less 



