AN ADVKNTITlOUvS HUD. 
3 
vine, but the leaves themselves are not opposite to each 
other, their arranj^emeiit being termed “ alternate ”by the 
botanists to distinguish this kind of plants from those whose 
leaves are placed “opposite,” or in pairs. The blo.ssoms 
are all “five-parted,” as the botanical term is, and any 
Ik)}^ or girl can pull a encumber blossom to pieces and quite 
easil}' find the five petals or “ blossom leaves,” perhaps a 
little grown together. The fruit is always nearly enough 
the same .so that any one can recognize a cucumber. 
Hut a more careful examination will show that no two 
leaves are alike, that they are not always placed at equal 
distances apart, that the Idossoms vaiy in place and num¬ 
ber and size, and that the cucumbers differ so greatly 
among themselves that no two precisely alike can be found 
in the whole world. In fact, almost the onl}^ thing that is 
always certain about the cucumber plant is that its blos¬ 
soms are never blue, and, so far as we now know, never 
can be. 
These differences show that the cucumber plant, like all 
other plants and animals, is constantly changing—ver}^ lit¬ 
tle, to be sure, in a 5 ^ear or in a hundred years, but chang¬ 
ing, nevertheless, as it has done from the time when it first 
began, and as it will do, prol^ably, .so long as cucumbers 
grow. 
In the midst of .so much change and so many variations, 
it is not strange that .sometimes a cell or group of cells gets 
mixed up with the others and out of place, or forgets what 
it was expected to make and goes to making something 
else. When this happens, buds may .start to grow in the 
most unexpected places, as in the case of the bud which 
grew to be a leaf on the side of a cucumber. Such growths 
are said to be adventitiou.s — that is, they are accidental, 
so far as any one can tell. Perha]).s, if we knew more 
about the cause, we sliould understand tliat there is noth¬ 
ing accidental in it at all. 
