86 :©otans 



flower are the stamens and pistils. These, held 

 together hy a little scale, can produce seed, and 

 some plants are so economical that they reduce their 

 flowers to this footing. 



Many trees and nearly all the grains and grasses 

 have this inconspicuous fashion of blossom. They 

 seem content to be taken on their merits, rather than 

 upon appearance. If such flowers have any color 

 it is in the stamens and pistils. Grass in blossom is 

 very beautiful ; the stamens and pistils are red, yel- 

 low, pink, purple, hanging looseh" on the stem like a 

 gauze decoration, with an undertone or ground of 

 pale green bracts. 



Only for a day or two can this simj^le and ex- 

 quisite l)loom be seen, for few things are so evanescent. 

 " As brief as bloom u^^on grass," is proverbial — 



"For the sun is no sooner risen with a burning heat, 

 But it withereth the grass, 

 And the flowers thereof falleth, 

 And the grace of the fashion of it perisheth." 



" Grace of the fashion of it " — that describes the grass 

 bloom exactly. 



What is called a perfect flower we will examine in 

 the common buttercup of the flelds. At the top of 

 the stem we find a cup or calyx of five narrow sepa- 

 rate green leaves, called sepals ; these form the outer 



