Page:An introduction to physiological and systematical botany (1st edition).djvu/136

 106 securely to so slippery a support, or to multiply the surface or points of absorption in so meagre a source of nutriment. The fibres of some parasitical plants already alluded to, chiefly of the beautiful genus Epidendrum, are peculiarly thick and fleshy, not only for the purpose of imbibing the more nourishment, but also to bind them so strongly to the branches of trees, as to defy the force of winds upon their large and rigid leaves.

2. Radix repens. A Creeping Root, as in Mint, Mentha. A kind of subterraneous stem, creeping and branching off horizontally, and throwing out fibres as it goes. This kind of root is extremely tenacious of life, for any portion of it will grow. Hence weeds furnished with it are among the most troublesome, as the different sorts of Couch-grass, ''Triticum repens, Engl. Bot. t. 909., [sic] Holcus mollis, t.'' 1170, &c.; while, on the other hand, many sea-side grasses, having such a root, prove of the most important service in binding down loose blowing sand, and so resisting the encroachments of the ocean. These are principally Carex