I IS THE FLOWERING PLANT. 



Sedges, again, possess minute flowers, often unisexual. The 

 perianth, when present, is reduced to bristles or scales, the 

 stamens have slender filaments, and there are two or three 

 spreading roughened stigmas. 



Wild plantains are all characterized by the following features, 

 which, after what has been said, will speak for themselves. 

 Flowers small, green, bisexual, arranged in spikes (or heads), 

 proterogynous. Sepals four. Corolla salver- shaped, with. four 

 small lobes alternating with the sepals. Stamens four, epipeta- 

 lous, alternating with corolla lobes, possessing long slender fila- 

 ments and large versatile anthers. Style long, covered with hairs 

 and with two stigmatic lines. As might be expected from such 

 a description all wild plantains are pollinated mainly or entirely 

 by the wind. 



Insect-pollinated (entomophilous) flowers are as conspicuous as 

 wind-pollinated ones are insignificant. They are characterized by 

 some or all of the following features. Perianth brightly coloured, 

 often irregular; pollen grains mostly rough or sticky; odorous 

 and nectar-producing. A modern botanist graphically describes 

 the state of things thus : — " The animate [pollinating] agent . . . 

 as a general rule is an insect. This must be allured to the 

 flower ; and this accordingly appeals to either sight or smell by 

 brilliant colours and by attractive scents. These colours and 

 these scents draw the insect to a flower from a distance ; but by 

 themselves they would be but empty gratifications, unprofitable 

 to insect and to flower alike. Something more substantial must 

 be afforded, something that will prevent the insect from merely 

 loitering about the flower in idle satisfaction, and that will induce 

 it to probe the recesses of the blossom, and in so doing to transfer 

 the pollen of one flower to the stigma of another. This further 

 allurement is addressed to the palate ; and though in some cases 

 it is nothing more than the pollen itself, in most it is supplied by 

 the secretion of a sweet fluid, the so-called nectar. 



"Now Nature, who at first sight often appears a prodigal, is 

 always found, on closer examination, to be the most rigid of 

 economists. If no insects are to be allured, she gives ... no 

 nectar ; she cuts off the bright petals, and suppresses the attrac- 

 tive odours. Nor even when a bait is wanted will she give it 

 one minute sooner than necessary. The brilliancy, the scent, 

 and the nectar are only furnished when the flower is ready for 

 its guests, and requires their presence ; just as a thrifty house- 

 wife lights her candles when the first guest is at the door. The 

 mature bud is furnished with no such attractions. Still more, 

 even when the flower is mature, when its pollen is ready for 

 transference or its stigma for pollination, when all the allure- 



