THE WELCOME OF THE FLOWERS 



385 



In the well-known window-plant, Aspidistra elatior, the flowers are some- 

 times protandrous and sometimes protogynous, and self-fertilization is still 

 further guarded against by the curious mushroom-like stigma, which covers 

 the anthers umbrella-fashion, so that the stigmatic surface is quite out 

 of reach of pollen from the same flower (fig. 463). '' The capitate stigma 

 closes the flower, leaving only four small openings through which Delpino 

 supposes small flies to enter ; the pollen falls out of the anthers and lies in 

 the cavity of the flower. The flies emerge all dusted with pollen, and 

 alighting on the stigma of another flower place pollen there before they 



FIG. 474. FORGET-ME-NOT (Myosotis palustris). 

 A well-known streamside flower with yellow-centred sky-blue corolla of salver shape. 



[E. Step. 



find the small entrance" (Miiller). These remarks apply equally to the 

 other species of Aspidistra A. lurida, punctate^ etc. > The flowers referred 

 to are also visited by numbers of Podura, probably for the sake of the 

 pollen, some of which they may carry from flower to flower. 



An even more curious way in which bisexual flowers lay themselves out 

 for cross-fertilization without irregularity is known as heterostylism. The 

 law is well illustrated in many plants of the Primula family, to which 

 the Primrose, Cowslip, and Oxlip (fig. 464) belong. " Most children are 

 aware," says Grant Allen, "that we have in our woods two kinds of 

 IT 7 



