94 SAGACITY AND MORALITY OF PLANTS. 



however — fruits have undergone perhaps more modi- 

 fications (seeing how important they are to the per- 

 petuation of the species) than even flowers. But 

 just as conspicuous and attractive flowers owe their 

 qualities to the necessity for insect visits, and the 

 crossing consequent upon them, so have conspicuous 

 and edible fruits been evolved chiefly through the 

 agency of birds^ to whose appetites they appealed 

 in the first instance ! 



It is both curious and interesting to find that the 

 parts which protect, conceal, and defend the seeds 

 of some plants, are those which have been specially 

 modified and adapted to attract attention in others ; 

 and that both sets of devices have been evolved for 

 the sake of benefiting the seeds. Thus the external 

 parts of the plum, cherry, peach, and other fruits, 

 are botanically the same covering as the hard woody 

 " shells " of the hazel and other nuts. In the former 

 instance the pericarp has grown sweet and succulent, 

 and has become brightly coloured and attractive 

 as well, so that it might catch the eyes of birds. 

 Fruit-eating birds have gradually become specialised 

 to this habit, as fruits have been developed. That the 

 latter have slowly caused their pericarps to grow 

 sweet and pulpy is proved by the ease with which 

 cultivation has, within the historic period, taken up 

 the matter, and rapidly converted our small wild 

 fruits (big enough, however, even in their natural state, 

 to suit the mouths and stomachs of birds) into the 



