466 



THE NATURE BOOK 



teeth, which are again cut up into 

 smaller ones. 



The flowers grow in close clusters along 

 the twigs — little rosettes of colour. Though 

 small and without petals, yet clustered and 

 massed they are effective, especially as 

 they appear before the leaves. Each 

 flower is both pollen-bearing and fruit- 

 producing, with central stigmas and from 

 four to six or eight encircling stamens, 

 emerging from a tiny pui-ple cup. The 

 stigmas mature first and overtop the yet 

 immature stamens. When the stamens 

 are ripe and shed their pollen on 

 the wind, the stigmas they now over- 

 top have already received their needed 

 pollen supply from elsewhere. So cross- 

 fertilisation is provided for. 



The fruit is in the 

 form of a seed enclosed 

 centraUy, or nearly so, 

 within a rounded flat 

 en\'elope ; thus winged, 

 it is blown away and 

 along by the wind, faU- 

 ing in showers, to cover 

 the ground for some 

 distance as with green 

 confetti. 



So far we have re- 

 garded points of simi- 

 larity only ; now dis- 

 tincti\'e differences may 

 be noted. 



RESTING BUD 

 (ENLARGED) 

 OF COMMON 

 ELM. 



It 



iiOW THE LINK OF ELMS JS PKOUUCED, AND A 

 SUCCESSION IS SECURED (.sec p. 468). 



THE COMMON ELM 



stands up the more commandingly. 

 Its great limbs reach up- 

 wards, and their terminal 

 twigs curve forwards. Its 

 hark is more deeply fur- 

 rowed, more voluminously 

 crumpled and folded. In 

 one variety, the twigs 

 show wide expansions of 

 corky superfluous bark in 

 ridges along their whole 

 length, doubhng and treb- 

 ling their apparent thick- 

 ness. One other tree — the 

 Field Maple — has its twigs 

 so thickened with excess 

 of bark, but in a different 

 fashion, as we shall see 

 later. On the Elm twig 

 these ridges of cork often 

 stand out from the central 

 axis in such a way as 

 to suggest the blades of 

 a ship's propeller. 



The leaves, on short 

 stalks, are more or less 

 rounded, with their widest 

 part generally towards the 

 base. The apex is drawn 

 out into a short point. 

 They are coarse in tex- 

 ture and tough, and owing 

 to the presence of short 

 stiff hairs are rough to 

 the touch. The flowers 

 are borne chiefly high up 

 on the tree's crown. The 

 fruit has its seed forward 

 in the rounded envelope, 



