It is not common
enough to possess a familiar name, but botanists have called it BAEA
HYGROSCOPICA, for it is always found near water, invariably pure, cool,
fern-filtered mountain water. From the damp rock the roots of the plant,
matted and interwoven, may be peeled off in a thin layer, for the plant
is epiphytical, depending as much upon heat, moisture and light as on
any constituents of the soil for sustenance. When the season is
exceptionally dry, the thick, soft wrinkled leaves become parched and
shrivelled; but a shower restores their vigour and lovely, tender green,
and fresh flowers slightly resembling the violet, but borne on scapes 6
or 8 inches long, bloom within a few hours of the revivification of the
plant. In moist seasons the plant, true to its hygrometic character,
continuously blooms, and while it braves the hottest sun on the bare
places of the burning rock as long as its roots find moist spots, it
will also be found in the shade below, where the flowers are richer in
colour, more of purple than mauve, and, rarely, pure white. Generally
the plant depends upon others or cracks or crevices in rock for
foothold. It shares the grasp the spongy moss may take on the slippery
surface, or when the root, thin as whipcord, of a certain fig-tree has
crept across the face of the grey rock forming a ridge or barricade
against which decayed vegetation accumulates, there the BAEA flourishes,
displaying an indeterminate line of mauve flowers above oval, crimpled
leaves.
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