164 The Great World's Farm 



vatories — that one can well understand its need of a large 

 store of food ready for immediate use, since it would be 

 impossible for leaves and roots to collect, manufacture, 

 and supply it as fast as it is wanted. 



The aloe does not, however, always die of its effort, 

 and may live to blossom again, some years later; but the 

 Talipot palm, though it attains a great age, spends its 

 whole life in accumulating food for its progeny; and hav- 

 ing once blossomed, it is quite exhausted, and perishes. 



Blossoming, then, is a serious matter for all plants, and 

 not to be undertaken without due preparation. But it is 

 a curious fact that the size of a plant's blossoms is often 

 quite independent of the size of the plant itself. Many a 

 forest-tree, for instance, bears flowers which are quite 

 minute and insignificant; others, as some of the palms, 

 bear spikes of blossom several feet in length and leaves in 

 proportion. As a rule, however, trees have small leaves, 

 small, dull blossoms, and small seeds for their size; but 

 they bear all three in large numbers. A diminutive cac- 

 tus, only a few inches high, on the other hand, may boast 

 a glorious crimson flower, measuring two or three inches 

 across; but then it has to be satisfied with one, or per- 

 haps two. The beautiful night-flowering cactus attains 

 some size, but it is a conservatory plant, not a tree, yet 

 its blossoms measure half a foot across and it bears at 

 times as many as twenty or thirty together. 



The largest known blossom, however, is that of the 

 extraordinary Rafflesia Arnoldi, a native of Java and 

 Sumatra, which, much more truly than even the orchids, 

 is **all blossom," for it has neither branches, leaves, nor 

 roots. Of course, therefore, it must needs be a parasite, 

 living by and sucking the life-juices from others; and it 



