AWAKENING OF BUDS AND THE SLEEPING OF LEAVES. 305 



curve its half-formed leaf downwards, the several leaflets all being at first 

 lacked together side by side, till the time comes to expand them and to 

 assume the horizontal position. 



Fig. 167 represents a young shoot of the Portugal Laurel. The stipules 

 are still present, but will soon fall off. The whole branch has grown 

 erect, as in the Ash ; while the blades are seen to be conduplicate, the 

 two halves are, however, represented as just beginning to separate from 

 each other. 



Laminar Scales. — For a bud-scale to be constructed out of a meta- 

 morphosed blade of a leaf is comparatively rare compared with the 

 previous methods ; but such occurs in the Lilac, Wayfaring-tree, and 

 Conifers, in which the common needle-like leaf is reduced to a sub- 

 triangular form in the outer scales. 



On dissecting a lilac-bud the scales increase in size from without 

 inwards, being elongated and boat-shaped, with a distinct midrib and 



branching lateral veins, as in a true blade, until one is arrived at having 

 a short, distinct petiole and a " cordate " base, when the true blade is 

 clearly revealed. This bud shows how rash it would be to assume that 

 the outer scales were of the same nature as those of the Ash or Lime, 

 though they are all apparently precisely alike externally. 



Vernation.^ — This word is applied by botanists to signify the various 

 ways in which the young leaves are packed up in the bud : on the one 

 hand, how each individual leaf is folded ; and on the other, how it lies 

 with reference to the rest. The commonest method in the first case is, 

 as stated, to be conduplicate ; and in this kind they may be fiat, as in 

 the Lime, or crumpled, like a closed fan, as in the Currant and Beech. 



With regard to the ways in which the leaves cover one another, a 

 common method is to have the halves of a blade slightly separated, and 

 so, standing at an angle, they can then fit over the others, either in two 

 ranks, as in Grasses, or three ranks, as in Sedges. A third common 

 method is to have each scale and leaf rolled round all the interior ones 

 in succession, as in the Cherry. 



The various differences can be best studied just as the bud begins to 



Fig. 167. 

 Portugal Laurel 



Fig. 168. 

 Laburnum. 



* From Latin ver, " spring"; vernation may therefore signify " spring quarters." 



