12 



Pawson : Weeds. 



a wild plant of the sea-cliffs. The goosefoots, like the beetroot, 

 certainly came from the sea-shore, for the whole order 

 ChcjiopodiacecE is littoral — Chenopodium, Beta, A triplex, Sali- 

 cornia, Salsola, Suceda — every family of it. There are nine 

 annual chenopodiums ; eight of them are weeds, and the other 

 is a plant of the sea-shore. This last probably represents the 

 ancestor of the whole of them. These goosefoots are great 

 haunters of manure-heaps ; perhaps they find there the best 

 substitute for the decaying refuse of their native sea-margin. 



It is probable that weeds have, by modification of their 

 organs, greatly increased their efficiency with regard to their 

 surroundings beyond the ancient types from which they sprung — 

 perhaps especially in flowering, in seed-bearing, and in seed- 

 vitality — on the side of reproduction, in short. Perennial plants, 

 confident in their own duration and in their increasing rootstock, 

 trusting in budding rhizomes and rooting stems, and bulbils 

 underground or in their leaf axils or in place of flowers, are 

 often very shy and lazy seed-bearers. The little celandine, for 

 example, and the cuckoo-flower, the lily of the valley and some 

 of the garlics, will rarely trouble themselves about bringing up a 

 family in the proper way, and the wood sorrel and many of the 

 violets will only produce a few cl'eistogamous seed-pods. But 

 to the annual plant seed-bearing is the only means of preserving 

 its race : in this it never fails, and in this quality the weeds far 

 excel the wild species. Economists tell us that when times are 

 good there are fewer single people ; men marry earlier and more 

 children are born ; and the flowers of the field seem to follow the 

 same rule. In the midst of the riotous plenty of the ploughing- 

 land our plants are wonderfully prolific ; they know nothing of 

 childless hearths and of barren marriages : they teem. 



Also the seeds of many of them possess a marvellous vitality 

 rivalling that of the fabulous mummy-peas. The plough goes 

 over them and buries them deep beyond the influence of the 

 life-giving sun, and the land is laid down to grass ; yet thus will 

 the charlock and the chickweed lie entranced like the Sleeping 

 Beauty for a generation, to awake again when the ground is 

 broken up and the sun-god kisses them. 



But this effectiveness of weeds in cultivated ground — their 

 abundance, their fertility, their strong hold on life — must not 

 blind us as to their real weakness. They are efficient only 

 among their present artificial surroundings. They have organised 

 themselves only so that they may better inhabit cultivated 

 ground. They have few points in common with a really 



Naturalist, 



