FLOWERS 



heaths, such as the huckleberry, the sacs 

 open by a hole at one end, and sometimes 

 the tips of the sacs are drawn out into 

 long, hollow tubes through which the 

 pollen is discharged. In other cases, as 

 in the sassafras, the sacs open by little 

 trap doors, which swing open as if upon 

 hinges. / 



Of the two parts of the stamen, the 

 filament and anther, the latter is the es- 

 sential one, so that in some cases the fila- 

 ment may be lacking entirely, only the 

 anther appearing to represent the stamen. 

 Furthermore, the essential thing about 

 the anther is the pollen, to manufacture 

 which is the sole purpose of the stamen. 

 The pollen is necessary to enable the 

 flower to produce seeds, but it must be 

 transferred from the anther which pro- 

 duces it to the fourth part of the flower, 

 not yet described, in which the seeds are 

 formed. This transfer of pollen is known 

 as pollination, and the transfer is usually 

 effected in one of two ways, by the wind 

 or by insects. As a rule, also, the pollen 

 made by one flower must be transferred 

 to some other flower to do its work, and 

 sometimes the other flower may be at a 

 considerable distance. 



If the pollen is to be transferred by the 

 wind it must be very light and dry, and 

 it must also be very abundant, for the 

 wind is a chance carrier and drops the 

 pollen everywhere in a very wasteful 

 fashion. In such a case the pollen must 

 come down like rain to be sure that some 

 of it strikes the right spot in the right 

 flowers. Occasionally one hears in the 

 papers of "showers of sulphur," which 

 always prove to be showers of pollen car- 

 ried by the wind from some forest (chief- 

 ly evergreen forests) and dropped at ran- 

 dom. In the case of pines the minute 

 pollen grains develop wings to assist in 

 the wind transportation. 



If the pollen is to be transferred by 

 insects it does not need to be so dry and 

 powdery, or so abundant as in the other 

 case, for the insect passes directly from 

 one flower to another, without any ran- 

 dom scattering of the pollen. Only 

 winged insects arc used for this purpose, 

 as those which must creep, or rather walk, 

 would brush the pollen from their bodies 

 by rubbing against the various obstruc- 

 tions in the way. The insects most com- 

 monly used are the numerous kinds of 



bees, wasps, butterflies, and moths. These 

 insects visit the flowers for different pur- 

 poses. The butterflies and moths are 

 after the nectar, while the bees and wasps 

 feed upon the pollen. Visiting insects are 

 therefore often grouped as nectar feeders, 

 and pollen feeders, but in either case they 

 are instrumental in transferring the 

 pollen. 



The fourth or innermost part of the lily 

 flower is an organ called the pistil. It 

 stands in the center of the flower and is 

 composed of three distinct regions. At 

 the base it is bulbous and hollow, contain- 

 ing the bodies which are to become seeds. 

 This bulbous region is called the ovary, 

 and the little bodies it contains, which, 

 through the action of the pollen, are to 

 become seeds, are called ovules. Rising 

 from the top of the ovary is a slender, 

 stalk-like part called the style; and at the 

 top of the style is a knob-like region 

 called the stigma. 



The most essential region of the pistil 

 is the ovary, for it contains the ovules. 

 Next in importance is the stigma, for it 

 must receive the pollen-grains. The style 

 is of least importance, and therefore' is 

 sometimes wanting, the stigma being di- 

 rectly upon the ovary. The duty of the 

 style, when it is present, seems to be to 

 put the stigma into a favorable position 

 to receive the pollen. It must not be sup- 

 posed that the stigma always resembles a 

 knob-like top to the style. It is really 

 only a surface prepared to receive pollen, 

 so it may be upon the top of the style, or 

 may run like a line down one side of it, 

 or may display itself in some other way. 



The pistil of the lily, however, is not a 

 single structure. If the ovary be cut 

 across, it will be found to be made up of 

 three compartments, each one of which 

 contains ovules. Each one of these com- 

 partments represents a unit of structure 

 which has entered into the formation of 

 the pistil. These units are called carpels, 

 and the pistil of the lily is made up of 

 three carpels. In this case the three are 

 !listinct only in the ovary, and have com- 

 pletely lost their identity in the region of 

 the style. In many relatives of the lily, 

 however, the three carpels are kept dis- 

 tinct in the style region, three styles or a 

 three-parted style appearing upon the 

 ovary. 



In some flowers the carpels are kept 



