274 FLASHLIGHTS ON NATURE 



together. The plant does that intentionally. It i^ 

 a slow and gradual flowerer. The reason is plain. 

 Our winter and spring are proverbially uncertain. 

 The bush does not want to put all its eggs into one 

 bucket. Sometimes, in doubtful weather, a few 

 of the buds develop up to the stage shown in 

 No. 8, and are just ready to open. Then comes 

 a frost, a killing frost, and nips them in the bud, 

 more literally than we often mean when we use 

 that familiar metaphor. In such cases, you will 

 sometimes find the more advanced flowers are 

 killed off and never develop further. But look 

 behind them in No. 8, and you will see that the 

 bush holds in reserve a number of younger buds, 

 against this very contingency. They are wrapped 

 up tight in their warm brown overcoats, and they 

 keep one another warm as they nestle against the 

 stem ; so that however sharp the frost, they seldom 

 suffer, in England at any rate. Beyond the Rhine, 

 where the winters are severer, both buds and foliage 

 would be nipped by the east wind ; and so the 

 smaller gorse is confined to the portion of Europe 

 west of the Rhineland, while even the greater kind 

 cannot live in Russia. To eastward its place is 

 taken by hardier shrubs, which have still more 

 special methods of protection against the severe 

 weather. In Western Europe, on the other hand, 

 the buds are so arranged that in spite of frost we 

 get a constant succession of gorse-blossoms from 

 November to May or June, when the running is 

 taken up by the smaller summer species. Thus 

 the bees are never deprived of gorse-blossom, 



