142 OUR ROCK-GARDEN 



demolition of the house the leading features were 

 brick-rubbish, mortar, and the like. On this very 

 unpromising site so much rosebay sprang up that 

 a botanist procured permission to pass the hoarding 

 and examine the various growths that were freely 

 blossoming in this strange position. In addition 

 to the conspicuous masses of rosebay that had first 

 attracted his notice he found thirty-four other 

 flowering plants, besides numerous grasses and 

 considerable patches of bracken. The agency of 

 birds probably brought the larger number of the 

 seeds to Whitehall, while others would be con- 

 veyed by the wind. From a ball of clay taken 

 from the foot of a partridge, Darwin one of the 

 greatest of experimentalists, and therefore one of 

 the greatest men of science grew eighty-two plants 

 belonging to six different species, so that it is 

 evident how potent a means of distribution such 

 unconscious transport may be. Amongst the plants 

 thus found growing wild within this quarter of a 

 mile from Charing Cross were the charlock, hedge- 

 mustard, shepherd's purse, chickweed, pearlwort, 

 clover, great willow-herb, spear-plume thistle, bur- 

 dock, May-weed, groundsel, colt's-foot, dandelion, 

 corn sowthistle, common sowthistle, gipsywort, 

 ribwort, knot-grass, thyme-leaved sandwort, creep- 

 ing-thistle, cat's-ear, orache, and climbing buck- 

 wheat. 



Perhaps one of the happiest of these accidentals 



