148 Field, Forest, and Wayside Flowers 



which supports the cat-tail ovary suggests the stalk 

 of a perhaps once perfect flower, and the bristles 

 the flower-leaves that used to be. 



So starting from the complete and perfect lily 

 with six creamy flower-leaves, six stamens, a 

 three-celled ovary, and a seed-vessel splitting into 

 three, we can trace every step in a downward 

 course till we come to the lowly estate of her 

 distant poor relations, the cat-tail flags. 



But in members of the lily's kin, of high or 

 low degree, the fibre-vascular bundles of the stem 

 are " closed," the leaves have parallel veins, the 

 parts of the flower follow more or less closely 

 the rule of three, the ripe seed contains abundant 

 nourishment, packed around the germ, and the 

 sprouting plant has one cotyledon. 



And in the kindred of the rose, aristocratic or 

 plebeian, the fibre-vascular bundles of the stem are 

 "open," and the leaf-veins branch into compli- 

 cated networks. The parts of the blossom are in 

 fours or fives. The nourishment garnered for the 

 germ is generally packed into the cotyledons, and 

 those cotyledons are two and opposite. 



So from the very first the great law of heredity 

 asserts itself, and the type of the race is impressed 

 upon the germ while it yet lies dormant in the seed. 



