266 



HUTCHINSON'S POPULAR BOTAXY 



glechoma). The small yellow flowers which peep through the tall grass in 

 the corner of the meadow belong to a species of Medicago the Spotted 

 Clover of Cornish nomenclature, the Medicago maculata or Spotted Medick 

 of botanists. The little purple spot in the centre of each of its cuneate 

 or wedge-shaped leaflets explains the origin of its specific name. Keep 

 a sharp eye on the hedges for a taller, purple-flowered species of this genus, 

 the Lucerne (M. sativa). whose serrated leaflets offer good examples of the 



oblong form. The flattened 

 apices of the leaflets 

 sometimes have a sharp 

 point about the middle, and 

 then they are called mucron- 

 ate. 



Daisies (Bellis perennis) 

 are everywhere the com- 

 monest of all flowers, yet 

 the flower that is never 

 common! Who of us that 

 loves Nature has not felt 

 something of Chaucer's de- 

 light in what a later poet 

 has called the " wee, modest, 

 crimson-tippet flower" 

 " the little dazy that at even- 

 ing closes " ? gladly con- 

 fessing with him that this 



is of all floures the floure, 

 Fulfilled of all vertue and hon- 



oure ; 

 And evir like faire and fresh of 



hewe, 

 As well in winter as in summer 



newe. 



FIG. 323.-PERFOLIATE HONEYSUCKLE (Lonicera capri- Bllt k is the br ad rOUnd 



folium), WITH CONNATE LEAVES ; AND PERFOLIATE leaves, whose margins taper 

 LEAVES OF HARE'S-EAK (Bupleurum rotundifolium). down to the base, rather 



than the pretty pink-tipped 



florets, that we have to notice (fig. 332 1. They are called spathulate-. 

 though you would probably find on examining other specimens that the 

 leaves more generally incline to the inversely ovate form, like those of 

 the Water-pimpernel. The London Pride (Saxifraga umbrosa) offers a 

 more fixed type of spathulate leaf ; but there is [small chance of finding it 

 growing wild in these parts (fig. 33< > . 



Before we cross the narrow footbridge and leave the stream at our back. 



