106 THE AMERICAN BOTANIST 



these beautiful flowers found in great abundance, for to such 

 retreats resorted lo to find sustenance and seek refuge from 

 her tormentor. Even to this day, aUhough most of the violets 

 have become blue from looking up at the sky, where lo now 

 dwells, they love to follow the cows wherever they go, whether 

 to mossy dell, moist meadow or shady wood, and whenever 

 you find bossy standing knee deep in the brook down by the 

 "old swimmin' hole" just look along the banks and there you 

 will find great companies of lo's faithful retainer and consoler, 

 the humble, modest, delicate violet. — Philadelphia Record. 



Structure of Lily Pistils. — The old idea of a com- 

 pound pistil was that it consisted of two or more transformed 

 leaves with their margins united and projecting inward bear- 

 ing the ovules. This view is essentially correct except that it 

 is likely carpels never were leaves although homologous with 

 leaves. Since such leaves as produce buds usually produce 

 them on their margins it would of course be expected that in a 

 compound pistil the bud-like ovules would be produced on the 

 part of the carpel corresponding to the margin of the leaf. This 

 in fact is what usually happens, but not always. According to 

 C. E. Temple in Science many members of the lily family, 

 among which are the tulip the white erythronium, the lily-of- 

 the-valley and the various "Easter lilies," bear their ovules 

 upon the middle part of the carpel. Even the partition walls 

 of the pistil may be developed from this part. At first glance 

 this may seem "contrary to nature" but it is no more remark- 

 able than that certain cells should develop leaves and others 

 petals, in the first place. Nature has a variety of ways of ac- 

 complishing the same purpose, and has apparently decreed that 

 more than one region of the carpel may bear ovules, without 

 regard to how much it may confuse our previously conceived 

 notions concerning the process. 



