222 HIGHWATER MARK. 



cell being placed considerably higher than the first. 

 It was occupied by a living tenant, in every respect 

 the counterpart of the former, with which it was con- 

 nected by a thread of pulpy vascular flesh, which 

 passed through a perforation in the partition-wall of 

 the two cells. 



From the angle formed by the second cell overtop- 

 ping the first, a third then budded in like manner, and 

 then a fourth, and so on; always maintaining the 

 same order, and thus growing in a two-rowed ribbon 

 of cells, each of which was intermediate in height be- 

 tween two others. 



After the rising structure had proceeded in this 

 way for the length of perhaps half-a-dozen pairs of 

 cells, the angle was filled by a knob of the horny 

 matter, which did not develop into a cell, but budded 

 out a cell on each side of itself, in the same plane as 

 before, but divaricating at a wider angle. Each of 

 these cells now proceeded to increase in the regular 

 way ; and the result of this was that two branches 

 were growing at once, the primary stem having forked. 

 And so the branches went on, growing and forking at 

 pretty regular intervals, until such a complex array of 

 spreading branches was accomplished as this which 

 we have in our hand. 



We have already noticed the recumbent character 

 of the shrub, and the rooting of the prostrate branches. 

 This is effected by the shooting down of slender tub- 

 ular fibres, which, on reaching the frond, divide into 

 a number of creeping radiating fibrils, of extreme 



