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Updated: May 31, 2025
We see how high in the scale of organization a plant may rise, when we look at one of the more perfect tendril-bearers. It first places its tendrils ready for action, as a polypus places its tentacula. If the tendril be displaced, it is acted on by the force of gravity and rights it self.
They likewise often become, after a time, in some degree spirally contracted. They therefore fully deserve to be called tendrils, as they are used for climbing, are sensitive to a touch, move spontaneously, and ultimately contract into a spire, though an imperfect one. The present species would have been classed amongst the tendril-bearers, had not these characters been confined to early youth.
Tendril-bearers can, from their first growth, ascend along the outer branches of any neighbouring bush, and they are thus always fully exposed to the light; twiners, on the contrary, are best fitted to ascend bare stems, and generally have to start in the shade.
We now come to our second class of climbing plants, namely, those which ascend by the aid of irritable or sensitive organs. For convenience' sake the plants in this class have been grouped under two sub-divisions, namely, leaf-climbers, or those which retain their leaves in a functional condition, and tendril-bearers.
He who will read my memoir on these plants will, I think, admit that all the many gradations in function and structure between simple twiners and tendril-bearers are in each case beneficial in a high degree to the species.
Nevertheless, from this statement by Mohl, I have ranked this species amongst the tendril-bearers; if classed exclusively by its foliar tendrils, it would be doubtful whether it ought not to have been placed amongst the leaf-climbers, with its allies, Fumaria and Adlumia.
Any one who will look during windy weather at twining plants will see that they are easily blown from their support; not so with tendril-bearers or leaf-climbers, for they quickly and firmly grasp their support by a much more efficient kind of movement.
In all cases the acquirement of sensitiveness by the mid-ribs of the leaves appears to stand in some close relation with the abortion of their laminae or blades. The latter, therefore, are intermediate in nature between twiners and tendril-bearers, and ought to be related to both.
Corydalis claviculata. This plant is interesting from being in a condition so exactly intermediate between a leaf-climber and a tendril-bearer, that it might have been described under either head; but, for reasons hereafter assigned, it has been classed amongst tendril-bearers.
The species to be described belong to ten families, and will be given in the following order: Bignoniaceae, Polemoniaceae, Leguminosae, Compositae, Smilaceae, Fumariaceae, Cucurbitaceae, Vitaceae, Sapindaceae, Passifloraceae. BIGNONIACEAE. This family contains many tendril-bearers, some twiners, and some root-climbers. The tendrils always consist of modified leaves.
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