Cleavers. 131 



capsules. At first sight, this difference between the 

 plants is rather puzzlini^, but when we come to con- 

 sider the peculiar habits of the corn galium we can 

 see at once the reason for the change. Like most 

 other cornfield weeds, it blossoms with the wheat, and 

 its seed ripens with the mellowing of the shocks. 

 Both are cut down together, and the seed of the 

 gahum is thrashed out at the same time as the grain. 

 Thus it gets sown with the seed corn from year to 

 year, and it would only lose by having a prickly fruit, 

 which would get carried away to places less adapted 

 for its special habits than the arable fields. It has 

 accommodated itself to its own peculiar corner in 

 nature, just as the goose-grass has accommodated 

 itself to the hedgerows and thickets. So again, in the 

 wild madder, the fruit, instead of becoming rough and 

 clinging, has grown soft and pulpy, so as to form a 

 small blackish berry, much appreciated by birds, who 

 thus help unconsciously to disperse its seeds. Each 

 plant simply goes in the way that circumstances lead 

 it, and that is why we get such infinite variety of 

 detail and special adaptation even within the narrow 

 limits of a single small group. 



And now I think you are tired both of your seat 

 on the gate and of my long sermon. Yet the points 

 to which I have called your .attention are really only 



