end, and the cuckoo is said to be polyan-



drous. Though, with very few exceptions,
our birds are all monogamous, in family
life they differ. The long-tailed tit's family
remain together all through the autumn
and winter, sometimes joined by another
family. Rooks, of course, live in a com-
munity ; I think it is not so much family life
as life of a community in the case of adult
rooks, but with long-tailed tits and partridges
it is a real family life which is continued after
the young birds have grown up until pairing
time in the next year. Anybody who has
had a tame covey of partridges knows how
attractive their family life is. The difficulty
I have found is that they have never stayed
with me after October, but have fallen in with
wild birds and left the garden, but a tame
covey of partridges is one of the most attrac-
tive things I know. That is a high form of
family life.

Now consider the robin. He has as
little family life as he can. Of course,
a pair of robins rear their brood each year ;




11'iUj'orU,



On its nest of fine grass, lichens, green moss, hair and other materials neatly felted

into a compact and cosy structure, sits the Golden-crested Wren, the smallest British

bird, It is very common, especially in fir woods.

387



THE PAGEANT OF NATURE



they may have a second brood, but when the
young are able to look after themselves the
old birds make the young ones separate from
them. And they are not content with that ;
the male and female will not spend the
autumn and winter together, but each robin
has its own territory in which it remains
separate and alone through the autumn and
winter. If you work in the woods or in the
garden you will notice
that you are often
attended by a robin,
but only one at a
time, and if another
turns up there is a
fight between the two.
The law of robins
apparently is that,
except in the actual
nesting period, each
robin must have one
territory, and if
another robin comes
he or she is breaking
the law of robins.
This law is as un-
alterable as that of
the Medes and
Persians; it is
probably much older,
and it has certainly
lasted much longer.
I know of a robin in
the nesting season
that was so anxious
to get food for its
young that it acquired
a habit of coming on
a human hand to get
food. It reared two
broods this year, and for a time the




Lang-ford.



The male Robin is a pusillanimous sort
of creature. Selfishly he clings to his
own territory, and if another turns up,
there is sure to be a fight. Except in
the nesting period, an intruder is
always dealt with as a culprit breaking
the law of robins.



I pass to the discreditable end of the scale
and find the cuckoo, which has no family life
at all. It is sometimes said that cuckoos
exercise a certain kind of superintendence
over their young that are reared by other
birds ; but it is doubtful.

I have taken these instances of birds
from common things, because I am trying
to show you the sort of pleasure which
anybody that has an
interest in birds may
find. All the things
I have been telling
(except the instance
of the widgeon, which
I admit requires an
enclosure with a pond,
where things can be
kept quiet) are what
anybody who lives in
the country may notice
and enjoy for them-
selves ; and they cost
nothing. You want
really nothing except
the power of walking
about, good eyesight,
and good hearing.
Of course, a push-
bicycle is very useful,
far better than a motor
bicycle or a motor-
car, which ties you to
the roads and makes
speed the main object.
A push-bicycle is a
much more sub-
servient thing. It is
silent, and it can
be wheeled across
places where no motor can be taken. A



young were in the same place with it. pair of good field-glasses are also useful.



That robin remains there now, and will
come on the hand and sit there and feed,
he is so confident. But he never follows
you from his own particular territory ;
if you want to give him food you must



Of course, outdoor nature includes many
other things about which I am not qualified
to speak. A friend told me that when
bicycling near my home with an ordinary
hedge on either side of the road, and a



go to his territory. If you go to another wood on part of one side of it, in one



part of the garden, some fifty yards away,
another obin will come and stand close by,
and if you put your hand on the ground he
or she (whichever it is) will take something
out of your hand. Its habits are quite
different from those of the other robin.
You never see the two together. Then again



half-mile, without getting off his bicycle,
he counted forty-six different kinds of
wild flowers. Think what that half-mile
was, from the point of view of interest to
my friend, and what pleasure people may
have who know anything about flowers.
The whole world of flowers and trees, of



388



THE PKGEFMT OF NATURE



course, can be treated from the same point
of view as that of birds. Then there is the
whole world of insects a very gruesome
world by all accounts in some respects, but
extraordinarily interesting. There is the
weather, which may be of the greatest in-
terest. I take great interest in the weather in
the country. It is always some sort of a day in
the country. The first thing I want to know
when I wake up is what sort of a day it is.
Then the seasons, and everything which
the seasons bring with them. There is
a book, a very remarkable one, written
in German more than sixty years ago, I
think, but translated into English, called
" On the Heights." In it there is this
sentence a peasant woman and her hus-
band happily married, living on their own
plot of land, and one day the peasant woman
is looking out of the window at the fruit
trees in the orchard and she says medita-
tively : " These are the trees that blossomed
and bore fruit, and then the snow fell upon
them, and then it was spring again." In
that one sentence there is the feeling of



outdoor home. You want to be in the same
place, seeing the trees and seeing the
seasons passing over the same trees, seeing
the first tender green of the leaf come out in
April or May, and then seeing the beautiful
colour of it in the autumn.

I would quote to you two stanzas of
Wordsworth which seem to me to have in
them the feeling that I have been trying to
express of the beauty of nature, of something
which may be a joy to everyone. They are
these :

They dance not for me,

Yet mine is their glee !
Thus pleasure is spread through the earth
In stray gifts to be claimed by whoever shall find,
And a rich loving kindness, redundantly kind,
Moves all nature to gladness and mirth.

The showers of the spring

Rouse the birds, and they sing ;
If the wind do but stir for his proper delight,
Bach leaf, that and this, his neighbours will kiss ;
Each wave, one and t'other, speeds after his

brother ;
They are happy, for that is their right !

That is the "joy in widest commonalty
spread."




Photo: Stanley Crook.

An April visitor, much loved for his free and powerful song, is the Blackcap. He
generally returns to his haunts of the previous year.

39



Wild Flowers and Their Ways



8.-PLANT ROSETTES

By EDWARD STEP, F.L.S.

With photographs by the Author

THERE are those who suppose that cases it will be found that it is forming a thick

when the wild plants are not in underground rootstock filled with starchy

flower there is little to interest the matter, as in to take exaggerated examples

amateur botanist in the countryside. This the cultivated parsnip and swede. Above

is a great mistake, for the genuine flower- ground there may be a rosette of leaves, the

lover has the aesthetic sense well developed, workshop of the plant, in which the starch

and can appreciate beauty of form as well as is manufactured and from which it is being



beauty of colour. With-
out the flowers to arrest
his attention, he is able
to enjoy the pure orna-
mental forms adopted
by leaves, and to ap-
preciate the utility that
goes with grace and
symmetry.

One out of the many
lines along which the
study of plant beauty
may be followed is to
gaze downward in the
open spaces of woods,
in the fields and along
the hedgerows, from
autumn to spring, and
look out for the biennial
and perennial herbs.
During their first year
such plants give no sign
of any preparation for
flowering, although in
reality they are making
strenuous efforts to that
end. All the plant's
energies are bent to the
accumulation of a
sufficient reserve of
material from which,
later, it can fashion a
tall-flowering stem and
the exquisite tissues and
pigments that constitute
the flower. In many




Amongst the reasons to be inferred
for the formation of plant rosettes,
such as that of the Hoary Plantain,
is the dominant one of self-pre-
servation from cattle on grazing
land. The plantains usually escape
because they sit too closely to
the soil.

391



poured constantly into
the reservoir below.

These rosettes are
often forms of great
beauty, and it is sur-
prising that no mention
of them is to be found
in the standard " floras."
At the most there may
be a description of the
" radical leaves " where
those of the rosette differ
from the " cauline " or
stem leaves. This is the
more surprising when
one considers not only
the important part
played by these rosettes
in the life history of the
plant, but what is more
important from the point
of view of the compilers
of " floras " that they
are distinct helps to the
identification of plants
that have not reached
the flowering stage. But
in the past the floras
have been compiled
mainly from dead
material in herbaria, and
until lately these have
not included specimens
of the plants showing
development from the
seedling stage.



THE PAGEANT OF NATURE



A little light is thrown upon the purpose side or patch of waste ground will afford
of the rosette when we discover that it is us examples. The most familiar of this
not formed fully in the case of annuals that class, of course, are the plantains and the
is, plants that arise from the seed and in the daisy ; but here it may be inferred that there
course of a few months have reached their are other reasons for the rosette. The
full stature, flowered, ripened their seeds plant wants a " place in the sun " and ob-
and died. A rosette, then, shows that the jects to having the vital light shut out by

the grasses and herbage around
it. By spreading widely and as
close to the earth as possible it
shuts out the light and warmth
from any seeds that may be under-
neath, preventing their germi-
nation and growth.

Another reason may be found
in any pasture where sheep or
cattle are turned out. If we
examine a patch of grazing land,
we shall find the grass cut off
very short and left fairly uniform
in height ; but the rosettes of
the daisies and plantains have
escaped, because they sit too
closely to the soil. Even the
long, thin leaves of the dandelion
are little affected. The daisy,
whose leaves are rather small and
unable to make a large rosette,
covers a large area of ground
effectively by the expedient of
branching from the base, and the
creeping shoots form separate
rosettes that fit close up to that
of the parent. By this method
a few plants can form a large,
connected colony. A somewhat




The Dwarf Thistle rarely produces any stem. It



has a very close and compact rosette, beneath which .,
no other seedling has a chance to grow, while its similar P lan ls adopted by the
sharp prickles resist all attacks by downland sheep, seaside variety of the beautiful little

sheep 's-bit (Jasione montand).

plant is either a biennial or a perennial. The normal form which brightens sandy
Many of the perennials, especially those heathlands is an annual, but the var.
of alpine districts, retain the rosette through- littoralis, found upon cliffs and sandbanks
out life, throwing up a temporary stem each by the sea, is biennial. This branches from
year to support and give greater prominence the base, and each offshoot forms a rosette
to the flowers ; but with the biennials in which to store material for use in its
plants that do not flower until their second second year.

year the formation of the rosette is the Our gardens apart from our lawns,
work of the first year, and the following which if not well kept will provide us with
spring or summer it disappears gradually, plentiful examples of daisy, plantain and
the reserve material stored in it being used dandelion afford us numerous rosette
up in the tall leafy stem that carries the plants for comparison with the native forms.



blossoms.



Among these are the auricula and London



Many of the perennials plants that flower pride, though the latter is a wild plant in
several or many years in succession have the West of Ireland. Now these represent
permanent rosettes, and every green way- the alpine type of rosette plants, and accord-

392



WILD FLOWERS AND THEIR WAYS




One of the handsomest rosettes is that of the Marsh

Thistle ; it can attain a circumference of eighteen feet,

and its gaunt stem may rise in the second year to a

height of eight feet.

ing to the books on structural botany, we
find that it is a habit of growth adopted by
plants subjected periodically or perman-
ently to severe drought or cold. But though
the rosette is characteristic of many alpine
plants it is not restricted to those of elevated
regions, for it will be found in damp
meadows at no great height above sea-level.
Although the two situations are so different,
there are similar conditions
affecting plant life in
both. The alpine plant
is liable to suffer from
dry air causing excessive
transpiration from its
leaves, and the risk is
much greater if the plant
has a tall leafy stem. By
suppressing its stem and
bringing all its leaves close
to the ground it is able
to maintain a circle of earth
cool and moist. As its
breathing pores are on the
lower surface of the leaves,
they act in moist shade
and the transpiration is
not nearly so great as it
would be if the leaves hung
in the air, allowing the
dry winds to attack the
lower surface. Some take



the additional precaution
of rolling their leaves
lengthwise to form a tube
in which the breathing
pores are kept moist.

These alpine plants
commonly grow in thin
soils where little water can
be absorbed by the roots,
so that the escape of water
through the breathing
pores must be reduced
to correspond ; otherwise
the leaves will become
limp and die. Even in
the damp, deep soil of
the lowland meadow,
absorption of water is
difficult in winter, and a
tall plant growing amidst
low grass would be exposed
to serious risk of losing
all its moisture by trans-
piration in such a wind-swept situation.

If we look at a tall plant like the very
erect teazel, it is not difficult to see how the
rosette condition from which it sprang was
brought about. The broad, prickly leaves
are given off in pairs at intervals up the
flowering stem, the point at which they join
the stem being known -as a node, and the
space between two nodes as an internode.




The Sow-thistle as here shown in the wheel stage. As

the central leaves develop, the complete rosette is formed

and the smaller plants now seen crowding between will

be killed by deprivation of light.

393



THE PAGEKttT OF NATURE




The smallest of our native species of
docks, the common Sheep's Sorrel, adopts
the co-partnership habit. Either several
individuals may unite in producing
rosettes, or extensive colonies maybe deve-
loped so that the rosette form is obscured.



Now, if we imagine that in the
growth of a plant it puts out the
normal number of leaves but fails
to develop the internodes, the
result will be a rosette. This is
what actually happens ; and if in
winter we look along hedgerows
where the dry stems still stand
crowned by their spiny seed-
heads, we shall find near by on the
ground the fine rosettes that are
the newer generation of teazels.
The long, broad leaves are spread
out symmetrically, a row of spines
along each side of the midrib
serving to ward off the attacks of
browsing beasts.

This winter form of the young
teazel may be taken as typical of
the temporary rosette of biennial
plants ; the stem is there, but
reduced to its least possible length.
In summer the growing point at
its centre begins to lengthen, and
continues, with nodes and inter-
nodes, until it is six feet or more*
in height. The growth of this
substantial, prickly stem is com-
paratively rapid, because the plant
has not, as in the case of annuals,
to manufacture its building



material as it goes. They are there stored
up in the rosette. That is the reason why
we fail to find the rosette when the biennial
plant has reached the flowering stage ; its
purpose as a manufactory and storehouse
has been served, and every leaf has been
drained of its useful contents.

Some plants that adopt the rosette habit,
though they make pretty designs upon the
ground, do not succeed in making really
good rosettes, and the reason is that the
leaves have long stalks. Of this kind is the
lady's smock, the sanicle and the round-
leaved sundew. The design they make
is more strictly a wheel pattern. This,
however, merges in the rosette, and some
fine rosettes begin as wheels. It is among
the composite plants that we find the best
examples of the rosette, and the finest of
these are to be seen among the thistles.

The dwarf thistle (Carduus acaulis) that
freely decorates the grass of our chalk downs
rarely produces any stem ; if it does it












A striking rosette of the downlands is that of the
Viper's Bugloss. Examples of diameters of four to
five feet are met with, and the greyish undivided
leaves are protected from browsers by a fringe of
sharp prickles.

394




LADY'S SMOCK.

Some plants, including the Lady's Smock, do not succeed in making really good rosettes,
and the reason is that the leaves have long stalks.



THE PKGEANT OF NATURE



of the dwarf thistle, and every
leaf is tipped with a sharp
bayonet. A fully-developed
rosette of this species is a
beautiful object at all times, but
in early morning, when it is
jewelled with dewdrops or
powdered with hoar frost, it is
a sight to be remembered.

Another very fine rosette
marks the first year's activities
of the musk or nodding thistle
(Carduus nutans) of our chalk
downs. Although the flowering
stem it has to provide is often
unbranched, it is very stout and
may be five inches in height.
Moreover, its scented, crimson
flower-heads are very large ; so
that its handsome rosette is large
also three feet or more in
diameter. Larger still is the fine
rosette of the marsh thistle
(Carduus palustris), whose gaunt
stem of the second year may rise
to a height of eight feet. " The
photograph on page 393 was
taken in the autumn of 1922,
on land that had several times
been swept by fire in the dry

measures only a few inches. As a rule we summer of 1921, so that its eighteen-feet
find only a very close and compact rosette circumference was free from contact with




Some of the British perennials produce permanent

rosettes, among which may be cited the common

Primrose.



about a foot across, nestling close to the
earth, of very dark green hue, with exceed-
ingly sharp prickles pointing in every direc-



other plants.

Our native species of scabious, allied to
the teazel, and not far from the composites,



tion, so that it is impossible to touch a leaf also produce rosettes, but whilst the leaves



with a finger-tip without drawing blood.
Right in the centre of the rosette lies the



forming them are undivided, the later stem
leaves are broken into lobes. The sow-



solitary bright purple flower-head, con- thistles, too, though their leaves are thinner



spicuous to bees
surroundings and



because of its dark
in spite of its low



and of more delicate texture, make rosettes
of very pleasing design. They may be



setting. Never a seedling has a chance of found in the waste corners of fields and



growing from beneath this close rosette ;
and the downland sheep may nibble close
up to its margin, but they dare not mutilate



along hedge-banks. One in the making
is shown in the photograph on page 393 at
present in the wheel stage, on a bank



a leaf of it. The small size of this rosette among violets and other plants. It is easy
is due to the fact that no tall stem is pro- to see that, with the filling up of the open



duced, so the leaves, not being required
for storage of much material, are short. In
this case the rosette is not temporary, but
continues throughout the life of the plant.
The splendid spear thistle (Carduus lanceo-



spaces in the wheel by the development
of the young leaves shown in the centre,
many of these smaller plants will be killed
out by deprivation of light.

A striking rosette of the downlands



latus), which later throws up a branching, is that of the viper's bugloss (Echium
many-flowered stem four or five feet in vulgar e), fine examples being four or five
height, forms a rosette twice the size of that feet across, the greyish undivided leaves

396



WILD FLOWERS AND THEIR WAYS



protected from browsers by a fringe of has achieved its end by the production of

prickles along the edges and others arising many dwarf branches, each densely clothed

from low warts all over the surface. As with stiff, grass-like leaves,
an example of the small rosette plants, In this article we have attempted merely

we may refer to the very common sheep's to sketch the general reasons for the rosette,

sorrel (Rumex acetosella), the smallest of In his rambles the reader, by keeping an

our native species of docks. Here several eye open for examples, will be able to

individuals may unite to form a tolerably add materially to our list, and by noting

symmetrical rosette ; but often they grow the conditions under which particular plants

in such extensive colonies that the rosette are growing may discover special reasons,



form is obscured.



other than those suggested, for the adop-



Some of the perennials produce per- tion of this form. It is only by such
manent rosettes, of which two notable tall- .careful observation of living plants under
stemmed examples are the burdock and the natural conditions that a full knowledge of
milk thistle (Silybum martanum), both with our native flora can be obtained ; the
broad leaves. A very pleasing one of this handbooks on the subject usually, for
class found along every wayside is that of the most part, give merely the dry details
the silverweed (Potentilla anserma). Others necessary for the identification of the many
will be found in the butterworts of bogs species,
and wet mountain sides, the
familiar cowslip and primrose,
and the less-known though very
plentiful sanicle (Sanicula europced)
of the woods.

If one takes only the examples
we have mentioned, it will be seen
that the most complete rosettes
are compounded of stalkless or very
short-stalked leaves. Where the
leaves have moderately long stalks
one purpose of the rosette fails,
for the open spaces between them
let light through to the earth,
enabling competing seedlings to
spring up and choke the rosette-
plant. The sanicle is a case in
point, but, though there are many
variations from the exact flat
rosette, the frequency with which
this form is adopted is a testimony
to its value in plant life.

Somewhat similar to the rosettes
in the objects to be attained by
their special growth-form, are the
cushion plants, of which examples
are to be found among native
species. Perhaps the most familiar
of these is the thrift (Statice
maritima), so abundant on our sea
cliffs as well as high up in the
mountains. Each plant forms a The small Scabious produces rosettes whilst the
close, rounded boss of vegetation ; leaves are undivided ; the later stem leaves are
and if the tough, woody rootstock broken into lobes. The lobed leaves, as shown in
be pulled from its crevice in the &'SS!S*S& be ' ng tO * seoond :y eal> P lant




rocks, it will be seen that the plant



(flowering), which has been covered partly by newer



rosette.



397




Photo : Henry Irving.



The Sweet Violet's habit of hanging its head is part of its particular scheme fop
securing fertilization and by no means due to excess of modesty, as the poets insist.



9.-THE SECRET FLOWERS OF THE

VIOLET

By G. CLARKE NUTTALL, B.Sc.



< < I ^ OTH the tame and the wild violets