DEVELOPING CHARACTERS 183 



"Because the sun reacts with the soil to pro- 

 duce bright colors, while the shade does not?" I 

 have been asked. 



I prefer to believe that insects make the colors. 

 The flowers which grow in the bright light need 

 their brilliance to attract the insects, flowers in 

 the shade are more easily observed if they are 

 light or white in color ; it is all a matter of adver- 

 tising contrast; and, throughout the ages, each 

 particular flower has been striving to perfect a 

 color contrast scheme of its own. It may be that 

 the combination of sun and soil makes possible 

 brighter colors than the combination of shade 

 and soil; but wind-loving plants, like corn and 

 trees, which grow in the sun, do not bedeck them- 

 selves in colors only the flowers which find it 

 necessary to attract the insects. 



In practice, at any rate, the color of a flower 

 is one of the reliable guides in the study of its 

 life history. 



Taking the orange daisy and its white cousin 

 side by side, we see at once a family resemblance. 



The leaf formation, the root formation, the ar- 

 rangement and the number of rays, the ar- 

 rangement of stamens and pistils, bespeak the 

 fact that here are two plants more or less closely 

 related ; one orange and one white ; the white one 

 a little taller, more graceful perhaps, and slightly 



