TEE FLOWER. 61 



distinct, this one general point you may note of both ; that, as 

 a calyx is originally folded tight over the flower, and has to 

 open deeply to let it out, it is nearly always composed of sharp 

 pointed leaves like the segments of a balloon ; while corollas 

 having to open out as wide as possible to show themselves, 

 are typically like cups or plates, only cut into their edges here 

 and there, for ornamentation's sake. 



22. And, finally, though the corolla is essentially the floral 

 group of leaves, and usually receives the glory of colour for 

 itself only, this glory and delight may be given to any other 

 part of the group ; and, as if to show us that there is no really 

 dishonoured or degraded membership, the stalks and leaves 

 in some plants, near the blossom, flush in sympathy with it, 

 and become themselves a part of the effectively visible flower ; 

 Eryngo Jura hyacinth, (comosus,) and the edges of upper 

 stems and leaves in many plants ; while others, (Geranium lu- 

 cidum,) are made to delight us with their leaves rather than 

 their blossoms ; only I suppose, in these, the scarlet leaf colour 

 is a kind of early autumnal glow, a beautiful hectic, and fore- 

 taste, in sacred youth, of sacred death. 



I observe, among the speculations of modern science, sev- 

 eral, lately, not uningenious, and highly industrious, on th . 

 subject of the relation of colour in flowers, to insects to se- 

 lective development, etc., etc. There are such relations, of 

 course. So also, the blush of a girl, when she first perceives 

 the faltering in her lover's step as he draws near, is related 

 essentially to the existing state of her stomach ; and to the 

 state of it through all the years of her previous existence. 

 Nevertheless, neither love, chastity, nor blushing, are merely 

 exponents of digestion. 



All these materialisms, in their unclean stupidity, are essen- 

 tially the work of human bats ; men of semi-faculty or semi- 

 education, who are more or less incapable of so much as see- 

 ing, much less thinking about, colour ; among whom, for one- 

 sided intensity, even Mr. Darwin must be often ranked, as in 

 his vespertilian treatise on the ocelli of the Argus pheasant, 

 which he imagines to be artistically gradated, and perfectly 

 imitative of a ball and socket. If I had him here in Oxford 



