64 Instinct, 



and trace the structure and function of organs by 

 which the young plants are matured and provided 

 for by their parents. 



Among our common plants we shall find abun- 

 dant illustrations for our purpose ; and the more com- 

 mon the better. When the apple blossom opens 

 in spring, the showy petals, that delight us by their 

 beauty of color and sweet perfume, are but the out- 

 er adorning of a much more wonderful workman- 

 ship within the flower. In the base of that flower 

 even now, the outlines of seeds can be found cover- 

 ed in the minute ball of tissue destined in time to 

 become the apple. But above those seeds rise the 

 stamens bearing pollen and the pistils to receive the 

 life-giving grains of dust. Lest the work should 

 not be well performed there is honey poured out 

 by the apple blossom as well as by thousands of 

 other flowers, to attract the bees, that in their eager 

 haste to gather the sweet scatter the pollen grains 

 upon the stigmas and distribute them from flower 

 to flower. When the pistil has conducted the sub- 

 stance of these grains of pollen to the seed, it has 

 at once an independent life. It is henceforth a 

 new plant, and the whole energy of the tree is at 

 once taxed to bring that seed to perfection and se- 

 cure for it the conditions of independent growth. 

 Around the germ, or in some organs connected 

 with it, the tree stores up starch, sugar and other 

 products fitted to support the young plantlet until 

 large enough to gather food for itself from the earth 

 and air. That this provision is for the young plant, 

 is shown by the fact that if the germ is not fertil- 



