above into numerous branches, which radiate in all directions 

 and are thickly covered below with brown dead leaves and 

 terminate above in a rosette of bright green linear leaflets. 

 The flowers, which are visited by many kinds of insects, are 

 of three kinds. Rarely we find cushions of flowers containing 

 both stamens and pistil in the same flower, but even here the 

 pistil becomes ready to receive pollen before the stamens 

 open so as to prevent self-fertilisation. Usually, however, the 

 flowers are unisexual and contain stamens or pistil only, and 

 staminate and pistillate flowers are borne on different 

 cushions. 



The Moss Campion is widely distributed in the moun- 

 tain regions of Southern Europe, North America, and the 

 Arctic regions. Silene exscapa closely resembles the above, 

 but is much less common. Its flowers are smaller and less 

 brightly coloured, and the separation between calyx and flower 

 stalk is more gradual and less abrupt than in the Moss 

 Campion. Its seed-vessel or capsule is, moreover, hardly 

 longer than the remains of the calyx which encloses it, whereas 

 the capsule of the Moss Campion projects well beyond the 

 enclosing calyx leaves. 



