HAVE PLANTS A PEDIGREE? 131 



Traveling 011 a June day from Bangor to Boston, we observed all 

 the meadows and waste fields through the shale region of Central 

 Maine overrun with bulbous crowfoot — the Ranunculus hulbosus. 

 The face of the earth over large patches was literally green and yellow, 

 and the chromatic eftect began to tell very unpleasantly on the eye. 

 Passing from the shale into a region of granite we found the butter- 

 cups giving place to the white-weed {Leucanthemuni viulgare). Over 

 the pastures of Massachusetts this was as common as the buttercup 

 in Maine, and the face of the earth was now white and green. The 

 relief was felt at once. It was now a pleasure to look on the mead- 

 ows. And yet the pleasure would have been still greater if the leaves 

 and grass had been light blue instead of green, as white and light 

 blue are in still better accord than white and green. But we will not 

 be over-critical. A lady in white can wear a scarf, or sash, or breast- 

 knot, of any color she may wish ; and Nature, if she decks herself in 

 white flowers, may set them in green, or brown, or red, or any tint 

 she will, and there will be no discord. 



The discords we have considered are between the flower and the 

 foliage. There are others in the flower itself. 



In the sweet-pea we have red and violet, a juxtaposition as dis- 

 cordant as that of green and blue. The bird-foot violet has the two 

 upper petals of deep violet, the others of lilac-purple or blue — another 

 discord. And such a collocation produces not merely a chromatic 

 discord. Rays of blue and violet, entering the eye together, cause 

 fluorescence of the cornea and crystalline lens. These parts become 

 faintly luminous by the absorption of such light, and vision is ren- 

 dered imperfect. 



All this may seem fanciful. A fleld of green and yellow may appear 

 to most eyes as pleasing as one of green and white. A violet, colored 

 in violet and blue, may be called as beautiful as a calypso, in yellow 

 and purple. But eyes which cannot see chromatic discord cannot see 

 chromatic harmony. If a bad picture does not offend the taste, a good 

 one cannot gratify it. There lies on our table a magazine printed in 

 colored inks, an effort, the publisher tells us, to supplant the old mo- 

 notony of black and white, and to minister to our love of color. It has 

 a yellow cover bordered with scarlet and labeled in green ! Flowers 

 may not be guilty of chromatic offenses so atrocious as this, but such 

 offenses they certainly do commit. 



What is the end of floral decoration ? By the old way of inter- 

 preting Nature, the botanist would have said, " To gratify man's love 

 of the beautiful." He would not give such an answer now. If he 

 would explain why certain flowers are not colored at all, and how it has 

 come about that other flowers are colored, some in chromatic har- 

 mony, and others not, he must look to the flowers themselves, and to 

 their servants the insects. Every one knows that the pollen must find 

 its way from the anther to the stigma, else the flower, lacking impreg- 



