156 HOUSE, GARDEN, AND FIELD 



CLIMBING PLANTS OF THE HEDGE. 



There are a number of climbing plants in our hedge. 

 We will first learn their names, and then try to find out 

 something about their mode of life. 



Tamus. This plant is better known by its English name 

 of black bryony. I much prefer English names for the use 

 of schoolboys, but the name of black bryony seems to me 

 open to serious objections. For it is so far from being a 

 bryony that it does not belong to the same family, nor even 

 to the same primary division of flowering plants. Bryony 

 is a dicotyledon ; Tamus a monocotyledon. Further, red 

 bryony takes its distinctive name from its red berries ; we 

 should therefore suppose that black bryony would have 

 black berries. No such thing ! It has green berries, 

 which when ripe turn to a brilliant red ; there is nothing 

 black about it but its root. I do not care to coin a new 

 name, and the Latin name is neither long nor hard to 

 pronounce. 1 Any of the descriptive books will show you 

 how to tell a Tamus. and I will pass by all its other 

 peculiarities in order that we may fix our attention upon 

 its mode of climbing. The stem and its long, slender 

 branches twine round their supports, and thus get sufficient 

 hold. They are often angular ; what advantage is there 

 in the angles ? (3) In what direction does the stem of 

 Tamus twine ? Some twining stems form right-handed 

 spirals, like a corkscrew or any other common screw, but 

 Tamus makes left-handed spirals. A stem which twines 

 like that of Tamus is also said to follow the sun, because its 

 growing tip rotates from east by south to west. Before 

 the movements of twining plants had been carefully ob- 

 served, some people thought that their spiral growth was 

 to be explained by their attempts to follow the sun. 

 Mention facts which refute this supposition. (4) How 

 many twining plants can you find in or about the village 



1 The proper spelling is, I believe, Tammis, which in Pliny is the name 

 of some kind of wild vine, or creeper. 



