Mr. Grant Aliens Botanical Fables 5 



indigestible fruits, like these little nuts, it was a clear 

 gain in the struggle for life to be eaten by birds, and, 

 consequently, to have something to tempt birds to eat. 

 Some of the ancestral Strawberries chanced to have a 

 receptacle a trifle more juicy than their chaffy brethren, 

 and by virtue of this piece of luck gave birth to more 

 than the usual number of seedlings, all reproducing and 

 some farther developing the maternal characteristic. 

 The most developed were throughout the most fortu- 

 nate, till the present state of affairs was reached ; while 

 the Strawberry plants which had not chanced so to 

 develop were utterly beaten in the race of life, to the 

 extent of becoming altogether extinct. By a like process 

 the berries (if we may so call them, for botanists will 

 reprovingly tell us they are no such thing) became red, 

 the colour serving as an advertising medium to let the 

 fowls of the air know where the now luscious morsels 

 were to be found. 



Now I am far from saying that this is an impossible 

 account of the growth of Strawberries I will not even 

 say that it is very improbable. But Mr. Grant Allen 

 gives it simply as matter of fact, as categorically as he 

 would tell us that Columbus discovered the New World. 

 Is it a certain matter of fact ? Are there no difficulties 

 in the way of accepting his piece of history ? 



A very notable difficulty is sure to grow in the same 

 hedgerow in the shape of a little plant, 1 a Potentilla, 

 first cousin of the Strawberry, and with a blossom so 

 similar that it has been said, by some botanists, 2 to be 

 undistinguishable. This Potentilla differs from the 

 Strawberry, we may say, only in this, that it has not 

 developed in the course of its history any juiciness or 

 edibility of receptacle. Its fruitlets hard and indi- 

 gestible as those of its cousin remain crowded together 

 upon a scaly and uninviting green receptacle, which no 

 living thing finds it worth while to eat. And, strange to 

 say, in spite of this circumstance, the plant has been 



1 Potentilla Fragariastrum, or Barren Strawberry. 

 2 Lindley makes this assertion, which is, however, incorrect 



