NEW GLEANINGS IN OLD FIELDS 



vastly more numerous I should say almost ten 

 times as abundant. You have to hunt for the males; 

 the others you see afar off. In my usual five-minute 

 morning walk to the post-office I pass several 

 groups or circles of females in the grass by the road- 

 side. I note how they grow and turn their faces sun- 

 ward. I observe how alert and vigorous they are 

 and what a purplish tinge comes over their mammae- 

 shaped flower-heads, as June approaches. I looked 

 for the males; to the east, west, south, none could be 

 found for hundreds of yards. On the north, about 

 two hundred feet away, I found a small colony of 

 meek and lonely males. I wondered by what agency 

 fertilization would take place, by insects or by the 

 wind. I suspected it would not take place, no insects 

 seemed to visit the flowers, and the wind surely 

 could not be relied upon to hit the mark so far off, 

 and from such an unlikely corner too. But by some 

 means the vitalizing dust seemed to have been con- 

 veyed. Early in June the plants began to shed their 

 down, or seed-bearing pappus, still carrying their 

 heads at the top of the grass, so that the breezes 

 could have free access to them and sow the seeds 

 far and wide. 



As the seeds are sown broadcast by the wind, I was 

 at first puzzled to know how the two sexes were 

 kept separate, and always in little communities, 

 till I perceived what I might have read in the bot- 

 any, that the plant is perennial and spreads by 

 46 



