194 ANNUAL OP SCIENTIFIC DISCOVERY. 



heart in the plant ; very often the anthers and pollen are yellow. It is 

 interesting to notice, that, according to the hue of the purple, so is the hue 

 of the contrasted yellow. Thus, in the potato and bitter-sweet the flower 

 is blue-purple and the stamens are red-yellow, while in the garden poly- 

 anthus the outer rim of the corolla is red-purple and the heart is greenish- 

 yellow. The harmony between purple and citrine may be seen in decaying 

 vegetation. 3. Orange harmonizing with Blue and Olive. This harmony 

 is less frequent ; still it is found in nature. Plants witha blue flower have 

 often orange anthers, and some syr.genesious plants have an orange flower 

 and an olive involucre. He had found it extremely interesting to trace 

 this harmony through the vegetable kingdom. Sometimes the harmonious 

 colors are on the same organ. Thus blue and orange are found on the 

 petals of the forget-me-not, yellow and purple on the pansy, calceolaria, 

 rnimulus, antirrhinum, &c. More frequently the harmonious colors are 

 found on different organs. Thus, we have frequently purple petals with 

 yellow anthers. Often the corolla is of oue color, and the calyx the com- 

 plementary color. He went on to say that the final cause of all this was 

 very evident ; the arrangements are in accordance with the structure and 

 likings of the eye. But there must also be an efficient cause. Possibly 

 this was to be found in the chemical changes of plants, and the relation of 

 chemical agents to colors. But it is, surely, also possible that there may 

 be a reality in color as there is in heat. This juxtaposition of contrasted 

 colors in plants does look as if there were polar forces operating in the 

 distribution of colors. On the supposition that color is in the object, we 

 can account for color as seen by the eye by supposing that every color on 

 the surface of an object repels the like color, and allows the others to be 

 absorbed. This was, however, but a vague hypothesis, in the absence of 

 a better, and was not to be confounded with the coordinated facts which 

 he had presented in regard to harmonious colors in plants. Dr. M'Cosh 

 went on to say that he had also noticed traces of harmonious colors in the 

 plumage of birds. 1. Black and white fcmnd in birds of tamer and 

 plainer plumage. 2. The second most common harmony is a red-yellow, 

 associated with a dark-blue. This reddish-yellow takes various hues ; 

 sometimes it is a tawny color,' at other times orange, and in some birds it 

 is a bright scarlet. The blue is also of various shades and hues, some- 

 times being a kind of dark-gray, at other times a very blue-purple, and 

 not uiifrequently of a greenish tinge. 3. In the more ornamented birds, 

 the harmonious colors are green and red. Sometimes we have a bluish- 

 green with a scarlet, at other times a yellowish-green, with a blue-purple. 



ON ASSOCIATIONS OF COLOR AND RELATIONS OF COLOR AND FOEM 



IN PLANTS. 



In a communication presented to the British Association on the above 

 subject by Dr. G. Dickie, he remarked that relations in the form, structure, 

 number and position of organs are familiar to every botanist : a priori it 



