AXILE ORGANS. 347 
be due to fungi as in the witches’ brooms (hexenbesen) 
of the German forests; in other instances, itis a result 
of mutilation as after the operation of pollarding. 
Moquin-Tandon' mentions a case in a grafted ash in 
the botanic garden of Toulouse, where below the graft 
there was a large swelling, from which proceeded more 
than a thousand densely-packed, interlacing branches. 
This must have been similar to the condition so 
commonly met with in the birch, and frequently in the 
hornbeam and the thorn, and which has prompted so 
many a schoolboy to climb the tree in quest of the 
apparent nest. It is probable that some of the large 
*onaurs”’ or “ burrs,” met with in elms, &c., also in 
certain varieties of apples, are clusters of adventitious 
buds, some of which might, and sometimes do, lengthen 
out into branches. 
An increased number of branches also necessarily 
arises when the flower-buds are replaced by leaf-buds. 
Occasionally, a great increase in the number of 
pedicels, or flower-stalks, may be met with in conjunc- 

Fic. 179.— Flower stalks of Bellevalia comosa, nat. size, after Morren. 


1 «El. Ter. Veget.,” p. 392. 
