63 WAYSIDE AND WOODLAND BLOSSOMS. 



as may appear at first sight, but alternate ; and there is the 

 very peculiar arrangement of two minute leaflets being placed 

 between each two large ones. The flowers are large in 

 proportion to the plant, of one uniform yellow, and borne singly 

 on a long stalk. The calyx is cleft into ten lobes, the petals are 

 five, stamens and carpels many. Although it is a common 

 roadside weed, it may also be met growing abundantly and 

 much more luxuriantly in wet pastures. It flowers chiefly 

 from June to August, and sparingly much later in the year. 

 Among its more immediate congeners may be noted : 



I. The Tormentil (P. tormentilla)^ a tiny plant that is abundant on heaths and 

 dry pastures. It has a thick rootstock, and slender, hairy, creeping stems. The . 

 leaves are cut into three, sometimes five, fingers, which are more or less wedge- 

 shaped, the free end lobed or toothed. Flowers yellow, and similar to those of 

 P. anserina, but smaller, and usually with only four petals. June to September. 



II. Creeping Cinquefoil (P. reptans). Similar to P. tormentilla but larger. 

 Leaflets five, sometimes three, petals five. Meadows and waysides. June to 

 September. 



III. Barren Strawberry (P. fragariastrunt). Flowers white. March to June. 

 The general characters of this impostor have been given on page 27, when describ- 

 ing the Wild Strawberry. The plant has a general silkiness which is foreign to the 

 strawberry. 



The name of the genus is from the Latin, otens> powerful, some of the species 

 having formerly considerable reputation as medicines. 



Small Bindweed (Convolvulus arvensis). 



With the appearance of the delicately fragrant Bindweed in 

 our fields the season for summer flowers may be said to have 

 fairly set in. Its grace of form and colour makes it a general 

 favourite, but it resents being plucked, and closes its pink cups 

 almost immediately. It has a perennial rootstock, which creeps 

 and branches underground, taking possession of much soil, and 

 sending up many slender twining stems clothed with spear- 

 shaped leaves. The sepals are five in number, but the petals are 

 entirely united to form a funnel-shaped corolla ; though the five 

 folds and lobes indicate the origin of the funnel. The flowers 



