QUEKETT MICROSCOPICAL CLUB. 413 



section exhibiting the stigma has several points of interest. At 

 the bottom of the tube are two large glands which secrete honey, 

 one on each side of the ovary. The ovary has two carpels, which 

 are separate, but are united at the top into a single style. This 

 goes up, and at the top expands into a wing-like disc, and termi- 

 nates with a crown of hairs like a sweep's brush. Some of these 

 hairs turn down into five little tufts, forming little alcoves, which 

 play very important functions. From the corolla arise five 

 stamens. The anthers are raised above, and are so curved over as 

 to enclose the whole and prevent ingress except between each pair 

 of stamens. The anthers open while in the bud, and then shed 

 their pollen, which, when the flower opens, is seen to be deposited 

 in five little heaps. Underneath the wheel-like formation, often 

 spoken of as a stigma, we find a frill-like, orange-coloured body, 

 which is not of the same depth all round, but opposite the little 

 alcoves already referred to deepens slightly. The true stigma is 

 formed by this curtain, or frill, and there we find the true stig- 

 matic tissue. Now as regards fertilisation. Insects (bees) come 

 for the nectar situated at the base. Grooves guide the tongue 

 between two anthers and past the upper ledge of the shelf, or 

 frill. Here it passes the little masses of pollen, which are slightly 

 glutinous, and, before reaching the honey-glands, comes in contact 

 with a wet, viscid fluid. ^Yhell the tongue is withdrawn, the 

 smeared surface comes in contact with the mass of pollen, which 

 adheres to it. But the plant does not want to part with all its 

 masses of pollen, and so some is scraped off the proboscis by the 

 projecting hairs, and remains until the visit of another bee, 

 which, perhaps, has already visited a periwinkle flower. The 

 tongue passes down past the stigmatic frill ; but in coming back 

 scrapes the pollen off on the under side, no trace of pollen 

 remaining on the part of the tongue previously smeared with 

 the viscid matter. This is the manner in which the plant is 

 fertilised. Last year the speaker had examined many plants in 

 order to see if they had been fertilised. It is commonly stated 

 that V. minor is infertile to its own pollen, and so seeds are rare. 

 Nearly all plants in one locality are probably products of one 

 plant, and have not come from seed. Of the plants examined, 

 70 per cent, had been fertilised by insects ; but no fruit of any 

 kind developed on the clump under observation. Mr. Brown this 

 year had fertilised one hundred flowers ; but it is yet too early to 



