Wild Flowers as They Grow 



grows wild in our lanes and woodlands, and this 

 prefers the poorer soils, and is specially noticeable 

 in hilly districts. From the little tufted root which 

 lasts on year after year arise straight, stiff, unbranch- 

 ing stems. Down by the root are larger leaves with 

 stalks, but higher up the stem the leaves are long 

 and narrow, with sUghtly toothed edges and no 

 stalks to speak of. It is worth noticing how care- 

 fully these leaves arrange themselves with regard 

 to the direction of the light, so that they may all 

 get their share of the sun and there be no imdue 

 shadowing one of another. In some of the garden 

 Golden Rods this arrangement becomes a perfect 

 and most definite imbrication, and the long, narrow 

 leaves droop, one slightly overlapping the next, 

 with the same regularity of pattern that one finds 

 in the tiles on the house roof. 



The blossoms are distinctly misleading to the 

 casual non-botanical observer. Each appears to be 

 a single five-rayed flower, with perhaps somewhat 

 complicated internal arrangements, for five yellow 



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