182 The Romance of Wild Flowers 
fore certain that a large number of florets will be 
fertilised by pollen brought from another Daisy 
plant, quite as many are bound to be affected by 
the pollen of the more central disk-florets of the 
same head. By this arrangement, which is pretty 
general throughout this great family, two advantages 
are secured: the continual crossing maintains the 
vigour of the race, and the fertilisation of the older 
by the younger florets of the same head insures the 
production of abundance of seeds. 
In spite of the earlier conclusions of Darwin, 
Lubbock, and others, that self-fertilisation is an evil, 
the enormous number of species of Composites, 
the abundance of individuals and their world-wide 
range, convince me that it is the happy mean 
between continual self-fertilisation and exclusive 
cross-fertilisation that “pays” best. 
The flowers of the Flea-banes, though yellow, are of 
similar structure to those of the Daisy, but the anther- 
cells end each in a little tail. The Common Flea-bane 
(Pulicaria dysenterica), figured in our plate, is a 
familiar example by moist roadsides and ditch-banks. 
A botanical description of the flowers of the 
Chamomiles (Anthems) would agree almost exactly 
with that of the Daisy; but the disk, which is only a 
low cone in the latter, is considerably elongated in 
the former. The plants, moreover, present a strik- 
ing contrast, such as would never permit confusion, 
were the flowers even more alike. The Chamomile 
(A. nobilis) forms a branching stemmed, leafy tuft, 
covered with finely divided, downy leaves, which 
exhale a sweet and pleasant aromatic fragrance. 
The smell of the plant is quite the opposite of its 
