156 FLOWERS OF THE ROADSIDES AND HEDGES 



angular, slightly downy, and branched. The leaflets are in pairs, 

 lance-shaped, 3-nerved, finely hairy beneath. The stipules or leaflike 

 organs, as wide as the leaves, are broadly lance-shaped and arrow- 

 shaped, the petals round. The flowers are yellow with darker veins, 

 borne on many-flowered flower-stalks, in racemes, drooping, turned all 

 one way, the flower-stalks as long as the calyx, which has awl-shaped 

 teeth. The pod is stalkless, with a long tapered point, containing 

 numerous seeds, and flattened at the sides. The seeds have a small 

 hilum. 



The plant grows to a height of 3 ft. It is in flower in June, July, 

 August. It is perennial, and propagated by means of the roots. 



When the keel is depressed the tip of the style emerges, and the 

 brush of hairs sweeps the pollen out of the apex of the keel, coming in 

 contact with the bee's abdomen, and recoils again when the bee goes 

 away. The vertical style is incurved, and expands below the oval 

 stigma into an elliptic lamina or plate, and is covered with oblique 

 hairs, and lies in the apex of the keel. Its hairy surface is turned to 

 the bottom, facing the free edges of the tip of the keel. There is a 

 pouch between the sides with a fold between to which entrance can be 

 had only at the tip. Its anthers lie in the pouch, ripen when it is in 

 bud, and pollen falls on the stigma. When the keel is depressed the 

 latter emerges and pollen is swept out. Pollen in the pouches is also 

 forced up. The wings and keel are closely locked, and it requires 

 a good deal of pressure from an insect to exsert the style and stigma. 

 In spite of pollen being pushed up close to the stigma, insects probably 

 cross -pollinate the flower, rubbing off its own pollen and applying 

 fresh. 



The visitors are all bees, Eucera, Bombus, Diphysis, and Megachile. 



The pod, which contains many seeds, contracts when dry, and 

 the seeds are thus expelled to a distance by a catapult arrangement. 



Meadow Vetchling is a humus-loving plant, which grows on humus 

 soil, or even sand soil where the ground is moist and damp. 



The larvae of Cecidoniyia lathyri cause the terminal expanded leaves 

 to meet and enclose the young leaves, on which they feed. The 

 fungi Uromyces pisi and U. faba both grow upon it. The beetles 

 Brtichus loti, Phyllobius uniformi, Apion subulatum, the Thysanop- 

 terous Thrips phalerata, the Lepidoptera Wood White (Leucopliasia 

 sinapis}, Botys fuscalis, Cemiostoma nuailesella feed upon it. 



Lathyrus, Theophrastus, is Greek for a kind of pulse, and the 

 specific name refers to the meadow habitat. 



Meadow Vetchling is also called Angleberries, Craw-peas, Fitch, 



