VENUS'S LOOKING GLASS 



141 



Venus's Looking Glass is more common in the south and east, 

 because it is best suited by a chalky or calcareous soil, and this type of 

 rock soil is confined to those districts. It grows amid the corn in parts 

 of the fields where the stalks are not close, and hides at the foot of the 

 corn like Lamb's Lettuce, with which at a cursory glance it might be 

 confused. 



It is a weak straggling weed, with a simple or branched stem, 

 branched at the base, and 

 erect. The leaves are ob- 

 long, with rounded teeth, 

 the radical leaves stalked, 

 egg-shaped or spoon-shaped, 

 and the stem -leaves are 

 blunt. 



The flowers are in the 

 axils, nearly stalkless, lilac, 

 few, terminal, or single. 

 The calyx exceeds the blue 

 corolla, which is open, and 

 the segments are long. The 

 corolla is wheel-shaped. The 

 capsule is triangular and 

 long. 



Venus's Looking Glass 

 is about i ft. in height. 

 Flowers are found from 

 May till August. It is an 

 annual plant, and increased 

 by seeds. 



The whole flower is like 



Campanula, but the ovary is very long, and narrower. The corolla- 

 limb is peculiar, the corolla regular, wheel-shaped, with the anthers, 

 which mature first, free, the corolla-lobes deep. The pollen is accumu- 

 lated on the hairs of the style. Insects alight on them and carry away 

 the pollen. At night the corolla folds up lengthwise, and the five 

 lobes become dusted with pollen. When ripe the three stigmas 

 lengthen, and insects deposit pollen on them from another flower, 

 whilst at night the pollen on the corolla touches the stigmas. 



In Specularia perfoliata the flowers are cleistogamic. In this 

 species the flower grows hidden amongst the corn, and insects cannot 

 find it, so that self-pollination is inevitable. 



Photo. A. R. Horwood 



VENUS'S LOOKING GLASS {Legousia hybrida, Delarbre) 



