76 THE PliENOMENON OF 



stages, from a few inches often to the enormous length 

 of 25 feet, and sink down again, with more rapid steps, 

 to about the same brevity; to which it must be added, 

 that on minute examination of the earUest subterraneous 

 leaves of the sprout, and of the cotyledons of the germi- 

 nating plant, the point of departure would doubtless be 

 found smaller, as, on the other hand, we may conclude, 

 from the file-like rows in which the flowers stand in the 

 axil of a bract, that the (in proportion to the flower) large 

 bracts are not the last members of the hypsophyllary 

 formation, but that undistinguishable hypsophyllary- 

 leaves (bracteoles) exist at the base of the individual 

 flowers, forming the true termination of the leaf-forma- 

 tion of the " stock." 



A similar rise and fall in the length of the leaves is 

 repeated in the region of the flower. The se2Jals are 

 sometimes immediately connected with the last hypso- 

 phyllary-leaves by their length, often by their whole 

 form, excepting the usually, greater breadth; this is the 

 case in Helleborus fmtidus, Buta graveolens, and Phloos 

 paniculata, in which the sepals agree almost perfectly, in 

 size and shape, with the last hypsophyllary-leaves. But 

 more frequently the calyx exhibits a new increase of 

 length in relation to the last hypsophyllary-leaves. To 

 confirm this I need only refer to the numerous plants 

 which possess bracteoles {VorUatter) on the peduncles of 

 lateral flowers, these bracteoles being almost always very 

 small and slender, and even frequently almost indis- 

 tinguishably small; see, for instance, Acotiitum, Del- 

 phinium, Viola, Polygala, Colutea and other Legumi- 

 nosEe, MoluceUa, Calamintha, Gratiola, Convolvulus, &c. 

 We can also detect this in terminal flowers, e. g. in 

 Biantlms, where the sepals, blended below into a long 

 tube, are preceded by several pairs of shorter scales ;* 



* The two to three pairs of scale-like leaves beneath the calyx of the 

 pinks increase in length in tlie ascending order, and therefore belong pro- 

 pei-ly to the new advance of the leaf-formation oomnieucing in the flower 

 forming an epicalyx, as occurs also in the mallow. 



