IN THE COPPICE
Outside the front door of Willow Farm is a broad curving gravel drive,
at the far end of which a white gate opens into the lane. On one side of
this drive is a narrow strip of ground planted with flowers and shrubs,
and close to the front door there is a patch of grass on which stands a
large old mulberry tree.
On the other side of the drive is a lawn. Beyond that are more flowers
and then the vegetable garden; further on still is a little wood or
coppice of nut bushes. On this March morning we shall find some wild
flowers in this little wood.
Between the vegetable garden and the wood is a low grassy bank. It is
bright to-day with yellow primroses. The Primrose always blossoms early
here, for the bank is sunny and is sheltered from cold winds.
[Illustration: PRIMROSE.]
I daresay most of you have seen a Primrose before to-day. Each pale
yellow blossom is made up of five petals, which are joined together
forming a tube or corolla. The petals are notched or indented on the
outer edge. At the centre of the blossom, where the petals meet, each
petal is marked with a spot of darker yellow. Each flower grows alone on
a long slender stem. At the top of the stem is a kind of green tube out
of which the yellow blossom appears. The Primrose blossoms have a scent;
not strong, but very sweet and pleasant.
The leaves are called "radical" or "root" leaves. They are so called
because each leaf _appears_ to grow direct from the root. But the leaves
really grow from a short stem at the top of the root--a stem so short
that it does not appear above the ground at all.
Among the bushes of the coppice itself we will notice the flowers which
first catch our eye--the pretty blossoms of the Wood Anemone. The whole
coppice is starred with the beautiful white flowers. We pick one and see
that it has six--six what? "Six petals," you say. No, these are not
petals, for the Anemone has none. They are sepals. The sepals of a plant
generally enclose the blossom before it is opened, and they are usually
green. In the Anemone the petals are absent; the sepals take their place
and are white instead of green. Their under side is often not pure
white, but is streaked with pale pink.
Several blossoms which we pick have six of these sepals. That is the
usual number, but sometimes there are only five, and sometimes more than
six.
The blossoms of the Anemone grow on longer and stronger stalks than
those of the Primrose, and on each stalk are three leaves. These leaves
grow round the stalk in a ring. Each leaf is "tri-partite"--in three
parts or divisions; the edges of these divided leaves are deeply
serrated. Besides the three leaves on each flower-stalk similar leaves
grow from underground stems which creep along not far below the surface
of the soil. Such creeping underground stems are usually called
"rhizomes."
At the further side of the coppice, where a hedge separates it from the
little meadow called Home Close, are Sweet Violets. We catch their
fragrant scent before we see them, for the tiny flowers are half hidden
among broad green leaves. Each blossom has five petals of a dark purple
colour; there are white Sweet Violets too, but none are growing in our
little wood to-day.
At the base of the blossom--the part where it joins the stem--one of the
petals has a little spur which points back towards the stem. The blossom
is therefore said to be spurred; we may presently see other plants with
spurred flowers.
There is another violet which grows wild in England--the Dog Violet. It
is larger than our Sweet Violets here, but it has no scent.
[Illustration: ANEMONE.]
While we have been examining the flowers on the ground, the nut bushes
above our heads are waiting to remind us of what we said just now--that
trees also have flowers. The flowers of the nut bush or hazel are easily
seen, for they appear before the leaves are open. What we see to-day are
often called catkins, but the name which country children give them is
lambs'-tails. It is a very good name, too, for they are more like the
tail of some tiny lamb than anything else.
These catkins are yellowish-white in colour, and soft and almost woolly
to the touch. They hang in clusters from the hazel twigs, and in the
strong March wind which blows to-day, they shake and flutter like the
tails of lambs at play. Some of them leave a dusty powder on our fingers
when we handle them; that is the pollen of the flower.
It is not where these yellow "catkins" are dancing on the twigs to-day
that the hazel nuts will appear in autumn. The nuts will grow on twigs
where there are very small red flowers--something like tiny
paint-brushes. These are the female flowers; they will be fertilized by
the yellow pollen of the catkins, and will produce the nuts.