II WAYSIDE AND WOODLAND BLOSSOMS. 



wet ground root at every leaflet, and develop a tiny plant from, 

 each. The flowers are nearly f of an inch across. 

 There are three other native species : 



Hairy Bitter Cress (C. kirsuta\ with white flowers, \ th of an inch in diameter ; 

 anthers yellow. 



Large-flowered Bitter Cress (C. amara), with creamy white flowers \ inch in 

 diameter ; anthers purple. Riversides : rare. 



Narrow-leaved Bitter-Cress (C. imfiatiens], white flowers, J inch across ; anthers 

 yellow. Shady copses, local. 



Name from the Greek Kardamon, a kind of watercress. 



Shepherd's Purse (Capsdla buna-pastoris). 



One need not travel far to find a specimen of Shepherd's 

 Purse, for almost any spot of earth that man has tilled will 

 furnish it. Wherever his fork or spade has gone in temperate 

 regions this plant has gone with him, and stayed. The flowers 

 are very minute, white, and are succeeded by the heart- 

 shaped seed-vessel (capsule) which gives its name to the whole 

 plant, from its resemblance to an ancient form of rustic pouch. 

 This splits into two valves, and the numerous seeds drop out, 

 The only native species : flowers throughout summer. 



Name : Latin, diminutive of Capsula, a little box. 



The Wood Sorrel (Oxalis acetosella). 



One of the most graceful and charming of native plants. It 

 abounds in moist shady woods, rapidly covering the leaf-mould 

 with its fresh yellow-green trefoils and pink- streaked white 

 flowers. In such a situation in April or May it produces 

 beautiful effects. A favourite position for it is the rotten centre 

 of some old beech stump, from which it will spread in a loose 

 cluster, " covering with strange and tender honour the scarred 

 disgrace of ruin/' as Ruskin says of the lichens. 



The roots are fine and scattered alon^ the creeping knotted 

 pink stems. The leaflets droop close to the stalk at night or 



