COLOUR OF FLOWERS—ITS INFLUENCE ON BEE-LIFE. 939 
procreative purposes. At other seasons the sexes studiously avoid 
each other, and in some gregarious animals they separate and 
form independent flocks, as amongst yellow hammers, chaftinches, 
wild American turkeys, and deer. 
Locomotive powers in plant life are very rare, and where they 
possess these powers it is more for the distribution of fertilised 
seeds than for the purpose of fertilisation. There are exceptions, 
I know—the Vallisneria spiralis, for instance. 
The higher order of animals are unisexual ; occasionally there 
ave malformations termed hermaphrodites ; but in the plant world 
the higher orders are unisexual, bisexual, or hermaphrodites— 
sea eae! when the male and ne female Bins or organs are on 
separate plants ; bisexual when the male and female organs are 
in separate flowers but on the same plant, hermaphrodite when 
the procreative organs are both in the same bloom (Laurels, Ist ; 
pumpkins, corn, &c., 2nd ; apples, pears, &e., 3rd). Yet, never- 
theless, no true flower is hermaphrodite—z.e., not hermaphrodite 
as the term is applied to the animal kingdom. The staminal and 
pistiline organs are not abnormal malformations, but both organs 
are perfect and independent of each other, and as a rule in 
hermaphrodite plants the anthers become distributive before the 
stigma becomes receptive, or vice versa; or, to make it clearer, 
the receptive and distributive organs do not mature at one and 
the same time in the same flower. 
From this it will be seen how utterly impossible it is, in the 
great majority of cases, for the anther, when distributive, to come 
into juxtaposition with the receptive stigma to effect the necessary 
discharge of pollen to ensure fructification. I am speaking now 
only of entomophalous plants. 
Oftimes in unisexuals that are entomophilous the staminate 
plant when in bloom is at a considerable distance from the pisti- 
line ; and in bisexuals both genders of flowers mature at the same 
time but on different parts of the same plants, while in herma- 
phrodites the sexes may be in close proximity ; nevertheless the 
male and female organs do not mature at one and the same time, 
then how can these inert beings become impregnated but by an 
agent other than itself—a foreign agent? In nearly every case the 
pollen of entomophalous plants is not dry and powdery as in the 
case with anemophilous blooms, but heavy and highly adhesive. 
It is this property of the pollen gathered by bees that enables 
them to stow it away so neatly in their pollen baskets. Its 
adhesive nature prevents its being blown about by winds, and 
causes an outside agent necessary to transmit it from the male to 
the female organs. 
Now comes the question, why are bees attracted to blossoms ? 
I mention bees because they are the only insects that gather and 
store both pollen and honey. Other insects feed on one or the 
