Stores of Food. 137 



sprouts in spring without contact with the earth ; 

 the stalk feeds upon this store of food gathered for 

 its use. The beet, and parsnip, and other kindred 

 plants, produce an abundance of flowers and fruit, 

 but not till the second year. The first year, the 

 whole energy of the plant is spent in providing a 

 large succulent root stored with sugar and other 

 organized materials. The second year, its whole 

 energv seems to be spent in producing an abun- 

 dance of fruit, and now it draws upon the collected 

 stores of the first year, and thus produces results 

 which would be impossible, were it compelled to 

 elaborate its food when suddenly needed by its mul- 

 titudes of flowers and se 



Other plants are many years, instead of one, in 

 making this provision. The so-called century 

 plant and others in their thick leaves store up vast 

 magazines of materials, that are used with astonish- 

 ing rapidity when the time comes for them to send 

 up their stems and produce their fruit. The same 

 process may be observed in many of our perennial 

 herbaceous plants, that do much of their curious 

 work beneath the soil. The broad-leaved orchis 

 and the Solomon's-seal are examples. They pro- 

 vide a large and vigorous bud as parent of the next 

 year's plant, and while a portion of the old root 

 decays, the remaining portion is packed with food 

 to send up from that bud now hidden in the soil, a 

 vigorous plant in the early spring, These provi- 

 sions are for the plant itself, and only incidentally 

 for the young plantlet which it is to produce. To 



