THE BOTANY OF THE APPLE TREE. 19 



surrounding the seed-pods. Unless there is fertilization, therefore, 

 there will be no apples. Now, while every apple flower has pollen in 

 its stamens, it is a well known fact that the fertilization is usually ef- 

 fected by pollen from another flower. This is due to the fact that 

 when the flower first opens, its stamens are not quite mature, while the 

 stigmas are ready to receive pollen. It thus happens that before the 

 stamens of any flower are ready to supply pollen to the stigmas, the 

 latter have received all they need from other flowers. This is effected 

 by bees of various kinds which search the flowers for honey, their 

 bodies in the meantime becoming covered with pollen which they leave 

 upon the protruding stigmas of the successively visited flowers. It is 

 probable that self-fertilization may take place, in the absence of in- 

 sects; in fact Mtiller makes the positive statement that such is the 

 case.* but this must occur under ordinary circumstances with compar- 

 ative infrequency, since bees are very common, and at the time of ap- 

 ple-blossoming are eager to visit every honey-bearing flower. 



It may occur, however, that heavy rains and violent storms may 

 wash away the pollen before the bees have carried it from flower to 

 flower. This I have known to occur more than once, and as a conse- 

 quence the crop was very light. I have no doubt that even in such 

 seasons many more flowers would be fertilized if every orchard con- 

 tained a few strong swarms of bees. 



The fruit of the apple consists, as has been already said, of the 

 thickened and fleshy calyx-tube which surrounds and encloses the five 

 seed-pods. At the top of the apple are to be found the remains of the 

 calyx-tips, hence this is called the calyx-end of the apple, or in horti- 

 cultural works it is commonly spoken of simply as "the calyx," and 

 the depression in which it is, as the " basin." 



At the opposite end is the stalk of the apple, originally the flower- 

 stalk, now deeply sunken by the downward growth of the thick calyx- 

 tube. The horticulturist speaks of the depression at the stalk end of 

 the apple as the "cavity." 



In a longitudinal section one may see lines extending through the 

 flesh from the cavity to the basin (Fig. 4, A, W B) ; these are very 

 small threads of woody matter, and may be designated as the woody 

 bundles : they are in fact the remnants of the framework of the calyx, 



*The Fertilization of Flowers, by Prof. Hermann Mueller, English edition, page 

 238. 



