Wild Flowers of Georgetown. 321 



often shaded with purple. Though not so sensitive as 

 the true shame plants (Mimosa) its younger leaves soon 

 close at a touch, The purpose served by these singular 

 irritable movements, in these and many other widely dis- 

 tributed plants, is so doubtful that it would be useless to 

 attempt to discuss the question here. 



The true sensitive plant most often found near town 

 is Mimosa poiydactyla, a pod-bearing but not a papilio- 

 naceous plant, having tiny pinkish-white blossoms 

 clustered in roundish heads close to the central stem ; 

 the highly sensitive leaves are very ornamental, with 

 several spreading segments or fingers, each one cut into 

 numerous pairs of small narrow leaflets. The accepted 

 formula among children here is to point a reproving 

 finger at the plant, saying "fie, for shame," when the 

 leaves double up and seem to try and hide themselves 

 away. 



Another native sensitive plant may be found at the side 

 of the second lake in the Gardens near the iron bridge. 

 It has yellow heads or tufts of flowers, and pretty 

 cockade-like leaves with six leaflets, each again divided 

 into numerous smaller ones. The pods, about an inch 

 long, form an irregularly star-shaped cluster. This is the 

 water shame plant (Ncptunia oleracca). Its spreading 

 stems are worth examination ; so long as the plant is 

 growing on land, it has ordinary hollow stalks ; but as it 

 advances into the water a thick wrapper of spong\ or 

 woolly texture forms round the branches, so that 1 iey 

 float buoyantly, sending down roots towards the ooze 

 below. Thus the plant always follows the- water, Ilea; g 

 as it rises and rooting in the shallows as it falls. 



Before we return to the papilionaceous flowers, lliia 

 ss 



