FLORAL FORMS AND THEIR RELATIONS TO INSECTS 353 



weather. Composite flowers constitute the largest order in the Vegetable 

 Kingdom (Composite), about one-tenth of the Flowering Plants belonging to 

 it. A characteristic of this order not yet touched upon, yet intimately con- 

 nected with our present subject, is the production of a pappus from the limb 

 of the calyx. Two forms of such hairy crowns are the sessile and the 

 stipitate. The formation of a pappus is looked upon as a modification of the 

 calyx. It is made subservient, as every child knows, to the scattering of 

 the fruit. 



In not a few flowers the corolla is provided with a supplementary organ 

 known as the corona or crown, sometimes called the paracorolla, which in some 

 cases is small and inconspicuous, and in others large enough to add materially 

 to the beauty or singularity of the plant. A corona is one of the dis- 

 tinguishing marks of the large genus Narcissus , to which our own Wild 

 Daffodil (Narcissus 

 pseudo-narcissus) 

 belongs. In a less 

 exaggerated form 

 this " corona " will 

 be found also in the 

 Forget - me -not 

 (Myosotis) and 

 Primula. Henslow 

 (Journal of the 

 Linnean Society, 

 vol. xvi., 1877) re- 

 gards it as a de- 

 velopment of a fold 

 in the inner epider- 

 mis of the corolla. 

 In the well-known 

 Poet's Narcissus (JV. 

 poeticus) the white 

 crown is surrounded 

 by a cinnabar-red 

 border, which is 

 probably a means 

 of attracting in- 

 sects ; and in most 

 species of the 

 family this organ 

 is either delicately 

 marke d or the 

 whole of the 

 corona is of a 

 ii 5 



Photo by] \. E - Sle P- 



FIG. 434. HENBANE (Hyoscyamus niger). 



The yellow corolla is veined with purple, and the urn-shaped calyx is persistent. The 

 seed-vessel is a box or pyxis with a well-defined lid. 



