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NATURE NOTES 
buds. What kinds of small birds are responsible for the damage 
I do not know : I only know that the damage is done, and done 
so effectually that in many cases the wood is killed where the 
buds are pecked out. Now what, I ask, is the remedy for this 
state of things? For my part I can see but one, viz., the 
protection of those large birds that are the natural enemies of 
the small ones. Let a Bill be passed by Parliament, enjoining 
the protection and encouragement of sparrow-hawks and all 
such predatory birds, especially forbidding their destruction by 
game-keepers, and I think the evil would soon be moderated. 
The balance of Nature would be restored, the small birds would, 
by the most merciful method possible, be reduced to their proper 
numbers, and we should no longer have to lament over devas- 
tated orchards and ruined fruit plantations.” 
OBSERVATIONS FOR YOUNG BOTANISTS. 
VIII. — Bracts and Inflorescences. 
E word “ Inflorescence ” stands for the way flowers are 
grouped together to make a single bunch, so to say ; 
but when there is only one flower, as of a tulip, then 
this itself constitutes the inflorescence. 
As leaf- buds, which develop into leafy branches, arise from 
the axils of leaves ; so, as a rule, a flower-bud arises from the 
axil of a bract. 
Since the parts of a flower are “ homologous” to, i.e., of the 
same nature as, leaves, though assuming quite different forms 
and functions, so bracts are only arrested leaves, but often 
altered in character. 
Bracts. — The first observation to be made is that all sorts 
of transitions can be found between a true leaf and a true bract. 
Let us take a few examples. The hellebores furnish excellent 
illustrations. The leaf is peculiar, having a much divided blade 
on the end of a long petiole. Now, if the stem be examined 
from below up to the flowers, between them and the leaves, 
will be found flattened petioles bearing very short segments to 
the much reduced blades. Higher up the petioles become 
broader and shorter, and finally the leaf segments are totally 
arrested : all that remains is an oval pointed bract, which is 
then seen to be really a leaf-stalk. If a buttercup stem be 
examined, it will be at once seen that the petiole is now wanting, 
the bract being made of the divided blade, reduced to a very 
few segments only. 
In some plants there is no difference between a leaf and a 
bract except in size, so that it is difficult to say which is which, 
,is in viper’s bugloss {ICchiinn viUgarc) and in willow-herbs. The 
interpretation of the origin of bracts appears to be that when 
