Personality of plants

PERSONALITY OF PLANT5
serves that purpose. A revolving root tip makes
a very efficient drill with which the hardy
plant may bore a way through refractory soil.
It is claimed that the great whirling sweeps
made by tendrils of various climbers are merely
amplifications of the circumnutation occurring
in all plant terminals.
Before leaving the subject of scientific movement
in the plant world, it will be of in-
terest to briefly consider some of the vegetable
motions which are called forth by the stimulus
of touch. Almost everyone is familiar with
the Sensitive Plant and its double rows of tiny
leaves. Touch any one of them and the whole
group will instantly begin to contract and bend
toward the stalk. We say begin, for so slow is
the transmission of the impulse that one can
readily see its progress, as one after another of
the leaves respond.
A motion which has forethought and design
behind it occurs in the leaves of the famous and
crafty Venus Fly-Trap. Two sections of leaves
edged with teeth-like nerve-hairs form the two
halves of an enticing-looking bowl and cover.
The slightest contact with one of the delicate
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