THE FLOWER. 



copiously secreted and contained. The central part of the 

 blossom, beyond the orifice of the nectary (shown separately in 

 Fig. 461), consists of one anther and a stigma, fused together 

 (the clinandrium) : the marginal portions, opening by a long 

 chink, are the two cells of the anther, approximate at their 

 broader portion above, widely divergent lielow : most of the 

 lower part of the spaee between is cxces>ively glutinous, and is 

 the stigma. The grains of pollen are united by means of short 

 threads of very elastic tissue into small masses, and these into 

 larger, and at length into pellets, having stalks of the same 



elastic tissue, by which they are 

 all attached to a firmer central 

 stalk, or cuudicle. (Fig. id.".- 1(!5.) 

 To the lower end of this caudicle 

 (directly to the end of it in our 

 Ilabenariae and Orchises gener- 

 ally, in this instance to the inner 

 side of tin 1 end. with a thick inter- 

 mediate base intervening), is at- 

 tached a button-shaped disk, the 

 face of which is exposed, and is 

 on a line with the surface of the 

 anther ; so that these two disks 

 look toward each other across the 

 broad intervening stigmatic space, 

 as seen in Fig. -li'il. The exposed 

 face of the disk being covered with 

 a durable layer of very viscid mat- 

 ter, the body itself is sometimes termed agland, andnot impro] >crly . 

 The viscidity is nearly of the same nature as that of the interven- 

 ing stigma, of which the glands are generally supposed to be 

 detaeheil portions. 1 1' so, then a portion of the stigma is cut off 

 from the rest and specialized to the purpose of eonveyauee of the 

 pollen. When a linger's end or any smaller body is touched to 

 these disks, they adhere so firmly that the attached /x>ll!n!<t or 

 pollen-masses are dragged out of the cell and carried away en- 

 tire. Some of these pollen-masses have been found attached by 

 the disk to the eyes of a large moth. When a moth of the size 

 of head and length < if proboscis of Sphynx drupiferarum visits a 

 spike of these (lowers, and presses its head into the centre of the 



465 



FIG. 463. A limn- ni:i^iiilio<l pollen-mass of Platanthera orbiculata. with its stalk 

 anil Ljland. 464. Five of the separate portions or pollen-pack'-ts. \\itli some of the 

 clastic threads nf tissue i-nnin rt im; them. 465. A portion more highly magnified, with 

 some <jf the pollen-grains in fours detached. 



