116 COLIN" CLOUT'S CALENDAR. 



call for a different modification ; and then we get all sorts 

 of curious distortions or abortions, as the case may de- 

 mand. Thus the beautiful pink grass - pea, growing 

 among tall blades on borders or fields, requires foliage 

 like the grasses themselves, in order to compete with 

 them on terms of equality ; and it has achieved its end 

 by dwarfing the leaflets till they have disappeared alto- 

 gether, while at the same time the denuded leaf -stalk has 

 flattened out into a broad blade, exactly imitating the 

 grasses among which it lives. In its close relative the 

 yellow vetchling all the true leaves are reduced to a long 

 tendril ; but to make up for them the barbed stipules or 

 flaps, normally mere tags about a quarter of an inch 

 long, have grown out into a pair of expanded and heart- 

 shaped green leaves. Here we must suppose that from 

 generation to generation the original leaflets got less and 

 less work to do, and so gradually died away by mere dis- 

 use ; while at the same time the leaf -stalk in the one case 

 and the stipules in the other grew larger and larger to 

 perform their new functions, because such organs were 

 better able to perform them under those peculiar condi- 

 tions than the ancestral leaflets, derived from a progeni- 

 tor of very different tastes and habits. Strangest of all, 

 in gorse the leaves assume the guise of stout green 

 thorns ; though the young seedlings have first trefoil 

 foliage, like the clovers, and only gradually produce more 

 and more lance-shaped blades as they reach the adult 

 condition. Here protection from animals is obviously 

 the object in view. Yet so rich is nature that all these 

 varieties of flowers, fruits, and leaves occur within the 

 limits of a single family ; and they may all be observed 

 together at this very moment in the July meadows or 

 commons of southern England, 



