1 66 



SAGACITY AND MORALITY OF PLANTS. 



that the flowers dependent on the visits of the former 

 would gradually adopt a " social " or " gregarious " 

 habit of life. 



There is another sense in which flowers may be 

 regarded as " social " organisms, and that in a much 

 higher and more specialised form than the accident 

 of mere congregation, viz. — when they cluster to- 

 gether on the same flower -stalk. All the methods 



Fig. 65. — «, Simple umbel of Cherry ; b^ Compound umbel of Fool's Parslej', 



of inflorescence known to and described by botanists, 

 — "spike," "raceme," "panicle," "corymb," "cyme," 

 " umbel," " capitulum," etc. — are only so many 

 methods by which flowers are grouped together for 

 mutual advantage. The numbers collected in these 

 well-known arrangements vary exceedingly ; but 

 their number is uniformly found to be related to 

 the size of the individual flowers. When the latter 

 are large, the number of flowers clustered together 



