154 THE STORY OF PLANT LIFE 
flowers, revolute and downy above, and on the 
midrib below, and as the English name implies, 
placed crosswise. 
The flowers are rose-colour, terminal, in umbels, 
secund, and drooping. The small flowers are ovate, 
and the style is not exserted. The flowers grow on 
short pedicels. 
The downy ovary is tipped with glandular hairs. 
The stem is glandular. 
It may grow to a height of 1 ft. The flowers of 
this evergreen shrub are in bloom from June till 
August. 
The campanulate flower is drooping, the pistil and 
stigma nearly filling the mouth, acting like a clapper 
tothe bell. The tube is narrowin the middle. At 
the base of the ovary is a dark glandular honey-ring, 
and the central style fills the mouth, the black, moist, 
sticky stigma, slightly protruding, being touched by 
an insect clinging on to the flower, which receives the 
sticky secretion. The eight anthers surround the 
style rising above the stigma, two long acute pro- 
cesses touching the sides of the corolla, as spokes of 
a wheel. An insect touching the stigma touches 
them with its proboscis. In the absence of insects 
the flower can thus be self-pollinated as pollen falls 
on the edge of the stigma. Bees and flies visit the 
flower. 5 
The capsule splits open from above and the seeds 
fall beneath, or, being light, are blown away by the 
wind. 
