8 PLANTS: THEIR NA TURAL GROWTH 



No. 19, the Pelargonium tomentosum, is, like No. 25, one of the numerous varieties cultivated 

 by florists. 



The Convallaria majalis (Lily of the Valley, or May Lily, fig. 20) may, from time to time, 

 be met with in woods, but it is as a garden flower that our readers will, no doubt, be most familiar 

 with it. Some of the older herbalists record the plentiful growth of this plant on Hampstead 

 Heath, and other equally well known localities near London ; but we need scarcely say that it has 

 long since been rooted out from, all these spots. It flowers during May and June, and, later on in 

 the year, the blossoms are followed by bright, red berries. From its mode of growth, it is a plant 

 well worthy of the ornamentist's regard, though it has comparatively rarely been employed by our 

 designers. 



The Potato (fig. 21), like many another lowly plant, has been overlooked and despised, its 

 very utility in another direction, like that of the beautiful-leaved Parsnep or Carrot, having been 

 against it; and there are few, we fear, who would risk the ridicule their nosegay wduld encounter if 

 this beautiful flower had a place in it. It is, nevertheless, a very ornamental plant; the leaf, flower, 

 and fruit that succeeds the blossoms being all very suggestive and beautiful forms. _ It was 

 given by the Department of Science and Art, one year, as the plant upon which all designs from 

 the various Schools of Art, competing for medals in a certain stage, were to be based. 



Of the Geum urbanum (fig. 23) we shall have occasion to speak in dweUing upon plate 21, 

 we, therefore, now defer our remarks on it, and pass to figs. 24 and 26 — the flowers of the 

 Potentilla anserina, or Silverweed, and of the Sambucus nigra, or Elder. The Silverweed is so 

 called from the whitish grey of its feathery leaves ; hence also in old works the plant is called 

 Argentina.. It is a very common wayside plant, the flower bright yellow, and the leaf somewhat 

 similar to that of the Agrimony. — (See fig. 258.) The Elder is almost equally familiar, as there 

 are few country hedge-rows where it may not be found. Its botanical name, Sambucus, is derived 

 from the Greek, and refers to a musical instrument made from those hollow stems so familiar to 

 the rustic intent on pop-gun making. The flowers are subject to a considerable amount of varia- 

 tion. Out of one hundred flowers, indiscriminately picked, we found that sixty-eight had the 

 corolla five-lobed, and with five stamens, while the remaining thirty-two had those parts in fours. 

 All the flowers were perfect, those having the corolla four-cleft being as free from all appearance 

 of distortion as those having the normal growth. Some plants are much more subject to this 

 irregularity of the floral parts than others ; thus, in the Blackthorn (Prunus spinosa), ninety- 

 three per cent, had the flowers of normal form ; in one hundred flowers of Cinquefoil (Potentilla 

 reptans) eighty had the divisions of the calyx and corolla in fives, the remaining twenty being in 

 sixes ; while in the lesser Celandine (Ranunculus Ficaria) — a plant in which this variation is 

 greatly marked — out of one hundred flowers ninety-seven had three sepals, two had ten petak, 

 nine had seven petals, eighteen had nine petals, sixty-eight had eight petals ; while one had five 

 sepals and fourteen petals, one had four sepals and seven petals, and one had four sepals and nine 

 petals. 



This variation is a matter well worthy of the study of the ornamentist, for though to 

 the scientific botanist the calyx and corolla hold a subordinate place to the stamens and pistils, 

 those inner organs which to him are the essential features ; to the ornamentist, on the contrary, 

 these outer rings of parts are the features of greatest interest and art value. 



PLATE 3. 



" The standing objection to Botany has always been that it is a pursuit that amuses the fancy and exercises the memor> 

 without improving the mind, or advancing any real knowledge ; and when the science is carried no further than a mere systematic 

 classification, the charge is but too true ; but the botanist who is desirous of wiping off this aspersion should be by no means 

 content with a list of names : he should study plants philosophically : should investigate the laws of vegetation." — WHITE OF 

 Selborne. 



In many plants, as we pointed out in our introductory remarks, the leaves that first rise 

 from the ground are different in form to those we accept as characteristic of the plant that may be 

 in question. They are termed seminal leaves (Lat. Semen, a seed) when they are developed from 

 the seed lobes, as in the Lupin ; they are ordinarily very simple in form, and fleshy in texture. 

 In some cases the leaves succeeding these, though different in form to the seminal leaves, are not 

 like the normal leaves of the plant. In this case they are known as the primordial or root leaves 

 (Lat. primus first, and ordo order). We see examples of these in the Sycamore, large garden 

 •Convolvulus, Sunflower (fig. 27), and the Radish (fig. 64). The variation thus afforded in the 

 foliation of a design is a point not without value. 



The illustrations 33 and 34 we have also referred to in our introduction, when speaking of 

 the great diversity of form that may be found in the various leaves of one plant, according to 



