658 DR JAMES STARK ON THE SHEDDING OF 
The spur first occurs as a bud in the axil of one of the solitary leaves on the 
elongated shoot of the year’s growth ; and, in general, is still a bud when the 
leaf drops off in November. Only about every fourth of the solitary leaves 
developes a bud in its axil; the rest have none. Next spring the bud enlarges, 
assumes the form of a spur, and pushes out from its crown a tuft of leaves: 
The spur once formed, remains attached to the branch for about eight years, 
and (when its growth is not brought to a premature conclusion by its ter- 
minating in a male catkin or female cone) annually developes from its crown the 
beautiful tuft of linear leaves which gives such a marked character to the foliage 
of the Larch. So long as growth goes on during the summer, the spur continues 
to push out fresh leaves from its crown; so that the leaf-fascicle gets larger 
and the foliage of the tree fuller as the season advances. It not unfrequently 
happens that a spur, after producing a tuft of leaves one year, becomes elon- 
gated the next season into an ordinary branch with scattered leaves. It is from 
the spurs, the aborted branches, alone that the male catkins and the female 
cones are developed. 
Cedrus, Libani C. Deodara, and C. Atlantica.—In the arrangement of their 
leaves these do not differ from the Larch; and, just as in the Larch, there is pro- 
duced, in the axil of about every third or fourth leaf on the elongated shoot, a 
bud which becomes developed as a spur, throwing out a tuft of leaves, often 
during the same season. During the following spring, when these tufts of 
leaves are well developed, the scattered leaves on the previous season’s growth 
of the elongated shoots wither and gradually drop off during the months of 
June and July. At the same time the older trees on each fascicle wither and 
drop off, one by one, as new leaves sprout from the crown of the spur; but 
this shedding of effete leaves occurs so gradually, that, unless carefully looked 
for, it would never be noticed. 
The genus Pinus, as resembling Larix and Cedrus, on the one hand, in the 
production of stunted or aborted shoots, and the Cypresses, on the other hand, 
in the phenomenon of cladoptosis, may be regarded, so far, as a connecting 
link between these two genera and the Cupressinee. 
Strange as it may at first sight appear, that leafy branches should periodically 
be thrown off by certain coniferous trees; yet the process must not be consi- 
dered as anomalous, but rather as a particular case of the operation of a very 
general law in the vegetable kingdom, at least where perennial plants are con- 
cerned. Thus, almost all the spikes and clusters of flowers we see in trees and 
shrubs, such as the Horse-chestnut, Maples, Laburnum, Ash, Azalea, Rhododen- 
dron, Elder, Lilac, Rowan tree, &c., are in reality metamorphosed branches, and 
yet they are cast off at the end of the season, when the fruit or seeds are ripe, 
by a process of disarticulation exactly similar to that leading to the fall of the 
raiiules in Cypresses and Pines. Cladoptosis then, in the widest sense of the 

