British Trees Volume 2 (Paperback)

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1907 Excerpt: ...wide apart, but the effect of raggedness which this produces in the blossom of the Blackthorn is here avoided, so wide-spreading are the stamens, and so closely are the florets packed together. Each floret has a pale green calyx with five yellowish toothed sepals; between these teeth grow the cup-shaped petals, bent sharply back from the base. Opposite every petal are three stamens with long spreading f1laments, and opposite each sepal one stamen, with a shorter filament, making twenty stamens in all. The pistil is found in the centre of all. It bears three erect white styles, placed close together, and surmounted by four pale yellow stigmas. At its base the tiny round green germ of the future berry can be distinguished. Elaborate as is the construction of each floret, every part being visible to the naked eye, it is yet only a quarter or half an inch in diameter, and but one in a crowded cluster some six inches across, while the tree is thickly covered with such clusters. The berries in September make a brave show with their scarlet colouring. The dense clusters of them, which replace the flowers, force the shoot down by their weight. The berries resemble little apples, and are about a quarter of an inch in diameter. They are greedily eaten by birds. THE LEAF. When the leaf is fully developed it occupies a slightly drooping position, with a tendency to become horizontal. It is made up of a terminal leaflet, and of seven or eight opposite pairs of 1 leaflets, which are all smooth and in colour a dark green on the upper surface and grey-green on the under. Though the leaflets have no foot-stalks of their own, they often lie close together without overlapping. The portions of the leaf-blade on either side the mid-rib in each leaflet do not exactly correspond;...