persons who have had the opportunity of watching the growth of the rose plantain must have observed the occasional production of flowers, sometimes stalked, in the axils of the leafy bracts, and at the same time have noticed that the internodes become elongated, so that an approach is made to the ordinary spike-like form of the inflorescence. The proliferous group would include such specimens as that of _P. lanceolata_ mentioned by Dr. Johnston,[118] wherein were several spikes, some sessile, others stalked and pendent, the whole intermixed with leaves and disposed in a rose-like manner. I have myself gathered specimens of this nature, occurring in the same plant, at Shanklin, Isle of Wight (fig. 56). [Illustration: FIG. 54.--_Plantago major_, with panicled inflorescence.] [Illustration: FIG. 55.--Inflorescence of _Plantago major_, with bracts partly replaced by leaves and spike branched.] [Illustration: FIG. 56.--Inflorescence of _Plantago lanceolata_, bearing a tuft of leaves and flowers at the end of the flower-scape.] It is rather singular that each species of _Plantago_ seems to have its own perverse mode of growth; for instance, the bracteate, polystachyate and paniculate forms are almost exclusively confined to _P. major_, the roseate form to _P. media_, the proliferous form to _P. lanceolata_. The instances wherein flower-buds originate from the surface of an inferior ovary, as in those cases where the top of the stem is dilated so as to form part of the fruit, would be properly classed under the head of prolification of the inflorescence. As, however, there is still some difference of opinion as to the correct morphological interpretation to be put on some of these cases, it has been thought better to include them under the head of heterotaxy than of prolification. [Illustration: FIG. 57.--Branched inflorescence of _Reseda luteola_.] Some of the cases of prolification of the inflorescence resulting in a branching of an ordinarily simple inflorescence, as in _Reseda luteola_ (fig. 57), might equally well be placed with fission or multiplication of the axile organs. Branched spikes of this character are not so common among Orchids as might be expected. Professor Reichenbach enumerates a few instances in the Report of the International Botanical Congress of London, 1866, p. 121, and the same author gives an illustration in his 'Orchidographia Europoea,' tab. 150. In Grasses, as indeed in other plants with a spicate inflorescence, this change occurs not unfrequently. The common Ray Grass (_Lolium_) is especially subject to the change in question, and among cultivated cereals, maize and wheat occasionally show this tendency to subdivision. One variety of the latter grain is cultivated in hot countries under the name of Egyptian wheat--_Triticum vulgare_, var. _compositum_. Prolification of the inflorescence has been most frequently observed in the following genera: _Leafy_. _Floral_.