AMONG THE WILD-FLOWERS 23 



they all bend to the west at his going down. 

 On the other hand, their brothers have stood 

 stiff and stupid and unresponsive to any influ- 

 ence of sky and air, so far as I could see, till 

 they drooped and died. 



Another curious thing is that the females seem 

 vastly more numerous. I should say almost 

 ten times as abundant. You have to hunt for 

 the males ; the others you see far off. One sea- 

 son I used every day to pass several groups or 

 circles of females in the grass by the roadside. 

 I noted how they grew and turned their faces 

 sunward. I observed how alert and vigorous 

 they were, and what a purplish tinge came over 

 their mammae-shaped flower-heads as June ap- 

 proached. I looked for the males ; to the east, 

 south, west, none could be found for hundreds of 

 yards. On the north, about two hundred feet 

 away, I found a small colony of meek and lowly 

 males. I wondered by what agency fertilization 

 would take place, by insects, or by the wind 1 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 conveyed. Early in June the 

 plants began to shed their down, or seed- bear- 

 ing 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, 



