LEAF-BEGINNINGS AND LEAF-FORMS 



265 



leaves, though it is vain to seek for flowers on them now. The capri- 

 cious days of April are the days when the nodding Violet blows. And here 

 is Wood-sorrel (Oxcdis), which children delight in, though for esculent 

 rather than aesthetic reasons. The form of the bright green leaflets which 

 compose its ternate 

 leaves is just the reverse 

 of the leaf-form of the 

 Violet ; for the rounded 

 lobes are at the apex 

 of each. Here the 

 shape is called obcordate. 

 You will notice also that 

 there is a notch at the 

 blunt apex of each leaf- 

 let, as though a piece 

 had been cut out. All 

 apices which have this 

 peculiarity are emar gin- 

 ate. 



Do not mistake that 

 pretty yellow-flowered 

 creeper, with quinate 

 leaves and inversely 

 egg-shaped leaflets, for 

 a species of Buttercup. 

 It is the Creeping 

 Cinquefoil (Potentil/a 

 reptans, fig. 326). You 

 will meet with it on 

 almost every wayside 

 bank, and often, as 

 here, winding its devi- 

 ous way among the 

 linear leaves of the 

 meadow Grasses. That 

 other creeper, with 

 fragrant kidney-shaped 

 (reniform) leaves, is a 

 frequent companion of 



the Cinquefoil, delighting, like its quinate friend, in sunny banks and meadows. 

 Its stalked and downy leaves, whose crenate margins should be noted well 

 (figs. 327, 331), w r ere in great request for tea in olden times, when the plant 

 was sold by the " herbe-women of Chepeside " under the names of Gill-by-the- 

 ground, Hay-maid, Cat's-foot, etc. It is the familiar Ground Ivy (Nepeta 



[E. Step. 



FIG. 322. MARSH-PLUME-THISTLE (Cnicus palustris). 



The loaves are deourrent, that is, continued as wings far down the stem. 



