154 PLANTS OF THE ALPINE MEADOWS 



thick, solid body which serves mainly as a store- 

 I house for reserve food materials. Externally it is 

 f sheathed in a few light brown scale-leaves of thin 

 papery texture. Numerous roots spring from the 

 base of the corm. From this underground stem, buds 

 grow out, one or more of which are flower-buds. 

 The central portion of each bud, the flower, is 

 pushed out first, and appears above the soil some 

 considerable time before the leaves, which in the 

 young bud surround it, reach the light. After the 

 flower has died down, the base of the bud which bore 

 it swells out into a new corm for next year. 



We shall understand how the Crocus manages to 

 come into flower at the earliest possible moment, if 

 the flower-bud, borne by the corm, is cut open length- 

 ways. It will then be found that the flower is 

 already developed in miniature. All the parts, such 

 ^^as the six perianth leaves, the three stamens, and the 

 ovary, are easily recognised. 



Thus we see that long before the snow of the 

 meadow begins to melt, the flower is ready. On 

 the coming of spring, all the plant has to do is to 

 lengthen the flower-axis below the flower, and thus 

 push up the flower to the light through the leaves, 

 which for the time being remain dormant. 



The Crocus, like some other Alpine spring flowers, 

 frequently does not wait for the snow to entirely 

 disappear. We shall often notice, where some patch 

 of winter's snow still lingers in a meadow, the state 

 of affairs seen in Plate XXXIL, Fig. 1. Here the 



