PERFECT FLOWERS 



81 



Polygala sanguinea 

 July 



This little flower is so inconspicuous as never to 

 have won for itself a common name, yet when ex- 

 amined closely it displays a sin- 

 gularly interesting form. Upon 

 a leafy stalk, from six to twelve 

 inches high, grows a globular or 

 elongated flower-cluster. If we 

 remove a floret from the cluster 

 we find it looks like a wee little 

 bird with magenta wings and a 

 yellow body. The wings are the 

 two loose sepals of the calyx, and 

 the corolla is a yellow tube with 

 pistil and stamens within. The 

 pistil has a very odd shape, with 

 large ovary and curved style sur- 

 mounted by a knob-shaped stig- 

 ma. The florets develop on the 

 spike from below upward, and as 

 they shed their pollen and the 

 stigma matures, the little yellow corolla assumes a 

 tone of magenta. The result is that the flower- 

 spike gradually assumes a deeper magenta, pro- 

 gressing upward from below; and consequently we 

 can tell from the colour just which of the florets 

 are in the staminate stage and which have developed 

 their pistils. 



POLYGALA SAN- 

 GUINEA 



