LEAF-BEGINNINGS AND LEAF-FORMS 



261 



But two- and four-leaved Clovers must be regarded as abnormal occur- 

 rences, the 3-foliate form being sufficiently common to be characteristic ; 

 and hence the Latin name of the genus Trifolium is quite appropriate. 

 Horse-chestnut-leaves, on the other hand, regularly vary as to the number 

 of their leaflets, and you will often find on the same tree 5-foliate or 

 quinate forms, 7-foliate or septenate. and so on. "When a ternate leaf is 

 further subdivided, it becomes either biternate or triternate, as in the 

 Master wort (Peucedanum ostruthium] and Baneberry (Actcea spicatci) respec- 

 tively. The Herb-paris (Paris quadrifolia),. which should be looked for in 

 moist and shady woods, has, as its Latin name implies, 4-foliate (quadrate) 

 leaves. 



Let us linger 

 among these 

 meadow Grasses a 

 moment longer 

 while we examine a 

 single blade of one 

 of them, with Ruskin 

 for our guide and 

 teacher. " Nothing 

 there, as it seems, 

 of notable goodness 

 and beauty," he says 



to us. 



A very 



little strength and 

 a very little tallness, 

 and a few delicate 

 long lines meeting in 

 a point not a per- 

 fect point, either, but 

 blunt and unfinished, 

 by no means a credit- 

 able or apparently 

 much-cared-for ex- 

 ample of Nature's 

 workmanship, made 

 only to be trodden 

 on to-day, and to- 

 morrow to be cast 

 into the oven and 

 a little pale and 

 hollow stalk, feeble 

 and flaccid, leading 

 down to the dull 



IE. step. 



FIG. 318. RAGWORT (Senecio jacobcea). 



The leaves are deeply cut into lobes in a pinnatifid manner The bright yellow 

 flower-heads are grouped in dense corymbs. 



