4 MYSTERIES OF THE FLOWERS 



their crops, never asking why their seeds were 

 formed, nor how they germinated. They saw each 

 flower bear pollen and nectar, and beheld the bees 

 despoil them of their treasures. The farmer saw 

 no connection between the seed and the pollen, 

 between the bee and the flower. 



They did not even know, though some very early 

 philosophers seem to have suspected, that a seed 

 is formed of two vegetable products, the yellow 

 pollen, and the soft green bead or ovule, just as a 

 crystal in chemistry is produced by the union of 

 two chemical products, an acid and a base. 



Considering the long years that went before, it 

 seems quite recent that in 1632 an English nat- 

 uralist, Nehemiah Grew, announced as his discovery 

 that, in order that a seed may form, the pollen of 

 a flower must touch its ovule. Without such con- 

 tact the ovule would never develop into a seed, 

 but would wither and come to nought. We know 

 this truth so well now that it seems strange that 

 there was ever much mystery about it; yet this 

 theory of Grew was then so novel that scientists of 

 his time were reluctant to accept it unreservedly. 



In 1735, however, the great naturalist, Linnaeus, 

 reaffirmed the theory and published numerous con- 

 clusive proofs of his own; and thus some progress 

 was made toward the unveiling of the mysteries of 



