LXXVI.— TRAVELLER’S JOY. 
Clematis Vitalba Linne. 
I T is not at first sight very obvious why a group of plants with woody stems, often 
reaching considerable dimensions, and with opposite, clearly compound leaves, 
such as are the species of the genus Clematis^ should be classed with the scattered- 
leafed herbaceous remainder of the Family Ranunculace^e. The coloured calyx and 
absent corolla, the indefinite stamens and carpels, the absence of cohesions among 
the floral organs, and the acrid juice are, however, sufficient reasons ; and, when we 
consider the long tail-like persistent styles which characterise this genus and some 
species of Anemone^ the alliance between these two genera appears very close. The 
main distinction indeed is that the sepals in Clematis meet in the bud without 
overlapping, i.e. are valvate, whilst those of Anemone and the rest of the Family 
are imbricate. 
In early spring the apparently lifeless tangle of twisted, grey, rope-like stems of 
our wild species, ragged with long strips of separating bark and hung with tough, 
wiry loops of the persisting leaf-stalks, some of the withered brown leaves of 
the previous year, and shabby tufts of the feathered fruits, puts forth rapidly 
elongating and gracefully curving shoots. These young stems are six-angled, dark 
olive-green, and slightly downy. Their young leaves unfold early in a vivid green, 
the uppermost only pinnately-lobed, or made up of three delicate ovate leaflets with 
downy under surface, but the fully-developed ones bi-pinnate, with from five to nine 
leaflets, each three or four inches long, on long slender stalks. Well did Gerard 
speak of it as 
Decking and adorning waies and hedges, where people travell, and thereupon I have named it the Traveller’s Joie.” 
One of the most interesting features in the genus Clematis is the method of 
climbing. The lower surface of the leaf-stalk is sensitive to contact, and some of 
these petioles thus become curved once or twice round any stem which they touch, 
whether of their parent plant or of any other. So tight is their grip that they some- 
times strangle the supporting stem to its death ; and, having twined round such a 
support they, unlike our garden Nasturtiums, become rigid and woody and persist 
for several years. Darwin, who suggested that we have here a first stage in the 
evolution of leaf-tendrils, pointed out that the leaves that have twined in this way 
have fewer and smaller leaflets than those which do not, as if they were on the way 
to lose their leaf-blades altogether. 
In May and June the cheery upstart gains the new beauty of blossom ; but the 
open branching clusters of greenish to cream-white flowers, though giving ofF a faint 
almond-like perfume, have no honey. As in wind-pollinated flowers generally, the 
stigmas mature a little before the anthers ; but flies and bees visit the blossoms for 
the sake of their pollen, so that the plant is, no doubt, often cross-pollinated 
by their means. 
