VII. 



SPRING FLOWERS. 



WALKING down the avenue the other day, I noticed 

 how the elms that line its sides and the flowering 

 almonds dotted about on the shrubbery were all in full 

 bloom long before the ordinary small plants could ven- 

 ture to peep out ; and I could not help observing that 

 this habit of early blossoming was closely dependent 

 upon the great size and perennial trunks of the larger 

 trees. They are enabled by means of their old wood to 

 store up in their permanent tissues the organized mate- 

 rial necessary for the production of flowers ; and so 

 they get a good start of all their less fortunate neighbors 

 and come in for the first attentions of the spring bees 

 and butterflies. To-day, however, out in the deep lane 

 which runs through Walcombe Vale, the similar efforts 

 of the smaller plants are forced upon my notice. There 

 are already some half-dozen flowers to be seen on the 

 high bank that bounds the lane or in the meadows on 

 either side ; and every one of these flowers has some 

 special device of its own which enables it to come out 

 thus early in the season, before many of its near allies 

 have begun to sprout from the swelling seed. It is a 

 general characteristic of all the first spring blossoms that 

 they appear either before their leaves, or else while the 

 leaves are still only half developed ; and of course such 

 a habit implies that material for their growth has already 

 been laid by elsewhere. For flowers are mere expenders 

 of food, not accumulators of food on their own account. 



