184 THE STORY OF THE PLANTS. 



and fertilising the flowers. Thus no plant can 

 properly be understood apart from its native 

 place; and I have therefore confined myself for 

 the most part in these few brief life-histories to 

 native British plants, whose circumstances and 

 surroundings are known to everybody. 



As an example of a very simple and easy life- 

 history, I will take first a little wayside weed, 

 commonly known as whitlow-grass, but called by 

 botanists, in their scientific Latin, Draba verna. 

 This curious little herb is not a grass at all (as 

 its name might make you think), but a member of 

 the great family of the crucifers, succulent plants 

 with four petals and six stamens in each flower, 

 to which the cabbage, the turnip, the sea-kale, 

 and many other well-known garden species be- 

 long. But whitlow-grass is not a large and con- 

 spicuous plant like any of these ; it is one of the 

 smallest and shortest-lived of our British weeds. 

 It has managed to carve itself out a place in na- 

 ture on the dry banks and in clefts of rock during 

 the few weeks in spring while such spots are as 

 yet unoccupied by more permanent denizens. The 

 herb starts from a very minute seed, dropped on 

 the soil by the parent plant many months before, 

 and patiently waiting its time to develop till win- 

 ter frosts are over, and warmer weather and 

 moisture begin to quicken its tiny seed-leaves. 

 As soon as these have opened and used up theii 

 very small stock of internal nutriment, the young 

 plant begins to produce on its own account a 

 rosette of little oblong green leaves, pressed close 

 to the ground for warmth and shelter. They eat 

 as they go, and make fresh leaves again out of 

 the absorbed and assimilated material. Direct 

 sunshine falls upon them full front; and as no 



