270 



HUTCHINSON'S POPULAR BOTANY 



Yonder dainty little plant, with bright scarlet flowers, is the Scarlet 

 Pimpernel or Poor Man's Weather-glass (Anagallis arvensis), which is no 

 less sensitive to the weather than the Corn-spurrey. Gerarde tells us that 

 the closing of the flowers " betokeneth rain and foul weather; contrarywise, 

 if they be spread abroad, fair weather." But as they have definite hours 

 for opening and closing despite the weather, absolute confidence must not 

 be placed in them as weather prophets. You will notice that the sea- 

 green sessile leaves are placed in pairs on opposite sides of the stem; 

 hence they are described as opposite, to distinguish them from alternate 

 leaves, which issue singly from their nodes, and which, as they succeed each 



other, are placed alternately on different 

 sides of the stem. Notice further in the 

 Pimpernel that each pair of leaves crosses 

 the pair immediately below it at right 

 angles, for which reason they are said to 

 be decussate. The Lilac (Syringa vulgaris), 

 Privet (Ligustrum vidgare), and Sycamore 

 (Acer pseudo-platanus) are other familiar 

 examples of decussate leaves. 



Here is the stile, and we may as well 

 step over it, and cross the dusty road to 

 the schoolmaster's cottage. Observe as 

 you do so the plant with prostrate stem 

 and pale greyish lilac flowers. It is the 

 Dwarf Mallow (Malva rotundifolia), a lover 

 of farmyards, field borders, and dry way- 

 sides. The specific name of the plant is 

 derived from its sub-rotund or orbicular 

 leaves a form which we have not hitherto 

 met with (fig. 333). Among Orientals 

 these leaves have long been in use for 

 culinary purposes ; indeed, it has been 

 supposed that this is the plant referred 

 to by Job, when he bitterly complains of the derision of men younger 

 than himself, "whose fathers he would have disdained to have set with 

 the dogs of his flock," and whose employment was once no better than 

 to " cut up mallows by the bushes." 



At last we are at the cottage. The little Pearlworts (Sagina procumbens), 

 straggling over the garden path, show that the neatly fenced garden has 

 been allowed to run somewhat wild of late. They are among the smallest 

 of our wild-flowers, and their awl-shaped (subulate) leaves are scarcely 

 thicker than a pack-thread. The Dandelions (Taraxacum officinale) witness 

 of the same neglect, and are disputing every inch of space with their 

 tinier neighbours. Observe the runcinate leaves of this weed, the pointed 



FIG. 329. LEAF OF ARROW-HEAD. 



A typical example of the aerial leaves of this 

 aquatic plant. For other forms see iig. 335. 



