142 Plants and their Ways in South Africa 



have very curious shapes. We liken them to butterflies, 

 spiders, bells, trumpets, lips, kalkoentjes, patrijsjes, kapjes ; but 

 since Latin names have been longest in books, we still use 

 them. The most important thing is to know the flowers and 

 to find out, if possible, how 

 they came by their different 

 forms. When the parts of the 

 corolla and calyx are all the 

 same shape, the flowers are 

 regular or actinomorphic. 



When they are two-lipped, 

 like Lobelia, or butterfly- 



FiG. \^.Disperis c.apensis, Swtz. 

 (Moeder capjes or Hottentot bon- 

 nets). 



FIG. 135. Valvate asstivation of Aca- 

 cia horrida, Willd. (From Edmonds 

 and Marloth's "Elementary Botany 

 for South A frica ' '. ) 



shaped, like the Pea, they are irregular or zygomorphic. 1 

 Bright-coloured flowers are often zygomorphic. 



Flowers built on the plan of three often have sepals and 

 petals of similar shape and colour. By this time you have ob- 

 served that certain flowers have three sepals, three petals, and 

 that the stamens and carpels are also three or some multiple of 

 three, while others are built on the plan of five. Four is less 

 commonly the number found. 



^Estivation. Like the leaf buds, flower buds have their 

 parts neatly folded. The stamens are curved inward to bring 

 the anthers as near the centre as possible, and sepals and petals 

 are wrapped around them. Sometimes petals and sepals are 



1 Of these terms zygomorphic, though a more difficult word to use at 

 first, is preferable, as the term irregular suggests that the flower is not sym- 

 metrical, as it generally is. 



