22 ENGLISH WILD FLOWEES. 



ferent forms and colours, which we call by the name 

 of flowers. The vegetative force of the plant is now 

 at zero the vegetative stage of youth passed away 

 for ever in an annual plant, for a season in perennial 

 plants, when the process is again renewed. 



In the meantime the plant enters on the period of 

 puberty. The leaves crowd together their structure 

 changes. The flower appears, which is only the leaves 

 in another shape ; and these shapes vary. In some 

 the various parts are well defined ; in others they are 

 all blended together, as if Nature laughed in scorn at 

 the attempts man has made to confine her within the 

 fetters of an artificial nomenclature, or to define her 

 handiwork. I will, for the sake of those who have 

 not trodden these paths before, use the convenient 

 distinction of parts to be found in highly organized 

 flowers. These are five in number, but one is only a 

 continuation of the other, so that there are but four 

 sets of metamorphosed leaves the calyx, the corolla, 

 the stamens, and the pistil. The receptacle is merely 

 the base on which these four parts are situated. The 

 true botanical flower is the pistil and stamens the 

 popular coloured flower the calyx and corolla. 



Let us consider these parts separately. The outer- 



