96 COLIJN" CLOUT'S CALEKDAH. 



this downward course : the initial stage through which 

 the ancestors of the mistletoe must once have passed, and 

 which the ancestors of the yellow bird's-nest must ages 

 ago have left behind them. The plants are not in any 

 way related to one another : on the contrary, they are 

 extremely unlike, as far as pedigree goes ; but they have 

 all three independently acquired the same parasitic 

 habits, and they all exhibit different stages in the same 

 process of degenerescence. 



Ancestrally, yellow-rattle is a near relation of the 

 pretty little blue veronicas and of the big purple fox- 

 gloves and snapdragons. It has a flower of the very 

 highest type one of those curious one-sided mask-like 

 blossoms with an upper and an under lip which are the 

 product of special insect fertilization and selection ex- 

 erted throughout innumerable generations. Flowers of 

 such a sort are the birthright of the most advanced fami- 

 lies alone. But this particular snapdragon family is one 

 of the most plastic and versatile in all nature. It may 

 seem fanciful to say so, but there are certain groups of 

 plants which really appear to be cleverer and shiftier 

 than all others, to have a greater power of adapting them- 

 selves by strange side modifications to the most diverse 

 situations. Perhaps one ought rather to say that they 

 are groups whose ancestors have undergone much varia- 

 tion, so that at last a tendency to vary easily has become 

 hereditary with them all. Of such families, the orchids 

 and the snapdragons are the most conspicuous ; and they 

 differ so much and so quaintly among themselves that 

 one can hardly avoid involuntarily attributing to them a 

 sort of human spontaneity and deliberate design. Some 

 of them mimic the forms and colors of insects ; others 

 assume the most fantastic shapes and hues apparently 

 out of pure wantonness, but really in order to insure 



