AT THE PERIOD OF PUBERTY. 163 



Now Apple trees are hermaphrodite, that is to say, they 

 are self-impregnating, the male and female organs being 

 situated in the same flowers. These organs are called, by 

 Botanists, stamens and pistils, and we must look for them 

 immediately within the apple blossom, or corolla. The 

 stamens, or male sexual organs, are very numerous, and 

 surround the pistils, or female sexual organs. All these 

 organs must be regarded as altered stem leaves, beautifully 

 organized with reference to the new and important func- 

 tions which they have to perform. In the stamen, the stalk 

 of the leaf is converted into a filament, and the dilated por- 

 tion, or blade, contracted into a little club-like body, called 

 an anther. This will be better understood by referring to 



Fiff. 2. 



Fig. 2, which represents one of the stamens of the Apple 

 tree. The filament is marked a, and the anther 5, which 

 is seen discharging its fecundating matter, or pollen. It is 

 because the anther prepares and discharges the pollen, that 

 we call it the male sexual organ of a flower. The female 

 sexual organ, or pistils, occupy the central portion of the 

 flower. They are so called because they receive the im- 

 pregnating matter, or pollen, a process which, in plants, is 

 indispensable to reproduction. The reader will form a 

 very good idea of a pistil by looking for a few moments 

 at Fig. 3, which shows one in section, or cut open. is 

 the stigma, or summit, of the pistil, to which the pollen 

 adheres when fertilization takes place ; b is the style of the 

 pistil ; a the ovary, containing the young ovules, which are 



