218 SPJilXO BLOSSOMS. 



of Miirch liave yet subsided or the showers of 

 April have ceased from falling. The hardy wall- 

 flowers that brighten the crannies of the rockery 

 as early as the golden crocuses themselves appear 

 above the neighboring beds, the white arabis, the 

 purple stocks, and the few other practically ever- 

 green plants that preserve their foliage unchanged 

 through the winter, are all perennials, and all owe 

 their early blooming season to the fact that their 

 leaves never drop, but go on laying up material 

 for flowers even in the very midst of a northern 

 winter. 



But, among perennials themselves, the ones that 

 send up the showiest blossoms in the first days of 

 returning spring belong almost all to the special 

 class which have learned to provide for an early 

 flowering season by laying by a rich stock of ma- 

 terial beforehand in a bulb or tuber. It is thus 

 alone that they can manage to produce a handsome 

 siiow before the foliage of the year has begun to 

 expand its m3^riad mouths to the sun and the 

 atmosphere. And for this reason it is rather 

 noticeable that a great many early spring flowers 

 unfold their buds either quite naked and leafless, 

 like coltsfoot and winter aconite, or while the 

 leaves are still very small and hardly showing 

 above the ground, as is the case with the crocus 

 and the snowdrop. The plant lays by starch and 

 other nutriment in the bulb or tuber during the 



