IV. THE FLOWER. 71 



you cannot but remember, of poppy-form among the corn- 

 fields ; and it is best, in beginning, to think of every flower 

 as essentially a cup. There are flat ones, but you will find 

 that most of these are really groups of flowers, not single 

 blossoms ; and there are out-of-the-way and quaint ones, 

 very difficult to define as of any shape ; but even these 

 have a cup to begin with, deep down in them. You had 

 better take the idea of a cup or vase, as the first, simplest, 

 and most general form of true flower. 



The botanists call it a corolla, which means a garland, 

 or a kind of crown ; and the word is a very good one, 

 because it indicates that the flower-cup is made, as our 

 clay cups are, on a potter's wheel ; that it is essentially a 

 revolute form a whirl or (botanically) ' whorl ' of leaves ; 

 in reality successive round the base of the urn they form. 



11. Perhaps, however, you think poppies in general are 

 not much like cups. But the flower in my hand is a 



poverty-stricken poppy, I was going to write, poverty- 



strengthened poppy, I mean. On richer ground, it would 

 have gushed into flaunting breadth of untenabie purple 

 flapped its inconsistent scarlet vaguely to the wind 

 dropped the pride of its petals over my hand in an hour 

 after I gathered it. But this little rough-bred thing, a 

 Campagna pony of a poppy, is as bright and strong to-day 

 ;as yesterday. So that I can see exactly where the leaves 

 join or lap over each other ; and when I look down into 

 the cup, find it to be composed of four leaves altogether, 

 two smaller, set within two larger. 



