Fig. 73
Fig. 74
Another plant that all of you country children ought to know, is the touch-me-not, or jewelweed. Sometimes this is called “lady’s eardrop,” because its pretty, red-gold, jewel-like flowers remind us of the drops that once upon a time ladies wore in their ears. These flowers we find in summer in wet, woody places. In the fall the fruit appears. This fruit is a little pod (Fig. [74]) which holds several seeds. When this pod is ripe, it bursts open and coils up with an elastic spring which sends these seeds also far from home (Fig. [75]).
Fig. 75
This performance of the touch-me-not you can easily see; for its name “touch-me-not” comes from the fact that if you touch too roughly one of its well-grown pods, this will spring open and jerk out its seeds in the way I have just described.
Fig. 76
In Europe grows a curious plant called the “squirting cucumber” (Fig. [76]). Its fruit is a small cucumber, which becomes much inflated with water. When this is detached from its stalk, its contents are “squirted” out as if from a fountain, and the seeds are thus thrown to a distance of many feet.