Daisies and Thistles ISI 
garden Chrysanthemums all stages of transition from 
disk-florets to ray-florets may be seen. In order 
to effect this great increase of size in these “ray- 
florets,” as we must term them to distinguish them 
from the yellow “ disk - florets,” something has had 
to go. 
It is a common rule in plant-life that display is 
effected as the result of economies in other directions : 
every one of these ray-florets has given up the 
production of pollen, and its stamens have gis 
disappeared. It would perhaps be more beet 
correct to say that the original head of 
flowers having taken to the method of 
developing its anthers before its stigmas, 
found that the pollen produced by the ‘ 
outer series of florets was wasted, there 
being no stigmas on that head ripe to 
receive it; then, the material saved was 
expended in the production of the flag-like 
rays. They still produce ovaries and 
pistils, but the material of which stamens 
and pollen would have been manufactured 
has gone into the conspicuous rays. There 
is a distinct difference in the stigmas of 
the disk and ray-florets; in the former these are 
short oval lobes, in the latter they are more slender 
and narrower. The florets are not all of the 
same age, and so we find that the outer ones 
discharge their pollen first, and the innermost 
last. It takes several days to accomplish the ex- 
pansion and fertilisation of the whole 250 florets, 
and consequently the Daisy remains fresh for a 
comparatively long period. Whilst it is there- 
Disk-floret of 
Daisy 
