A Family History. 227 



distinguished position than their ancestors. About 

 these black sheep of the rose family I must finally 

 say a few words. 



In order to get at them, we must go back once 

 more to that simple central group of roses which 

 includes the potentillas and the strawberry. These 

 plants, as we saw, are mostly small trailers or creepers 

 among grass or on banks ; and they have little yellow 

 or white blossoms, fertilised by the aid of insects. In 

 most cases their flowers, though small, are distinct 

 enough to attract attention in solitary arrangement. 

 There are some species of this group, however, in 

 which the flowers have become very much dwarfed, 

 so that by themselves they would be quite too tiny 

 to allure the eyes of bees or butterflies. This is the 

 case among the meadow-sweets, to which branch also 

 the spiraeas of our gardens and conservatories belong. 

 Our common English meadow-sweet has close trusses 

 of numerous small whitish or cream-coloured flowers, 

 thickly clustered together in dense bunches at the 

 end of the stems ; and in this way, as well as by their 

 powerful perfume, the tiny blossoms, too minute to 

 attract attention separately, are able to secure the 

 desired attentions of any passing insect. In their 

 case, as elsewhere, union is strength. The foreign 

 spiraeas cultivated in our hothouses have even smaller 



