THE DAISY. 2 



no less than forty-two British genera, which are divided into two 

 series. Several of these genera will be illustrated and described 

 in succeeding pages, but in all the flower-heads will be found to 

 be constructed in the main after the manner of the Daisy. 

 Some will be found to have no ray-florets, others to be com- 

 posed entirely of ray-florets ; and all these modifications of the 

 type give the distinctive characters to the various genera. 



The Cowslip or Paigle (Primula veris). 



In April and May in clayey meadows and pastures through- 

 out England and Ireland the Cowslip is abundant ; in Scotland 

 rare. The flowers are of a rich yellow hue, and funnel-shaped, 

 the five petals being joined to form a long tube. They are 

 borne on short pedicels, a number of which spring from a long, 

 stout, velvety stalk, three to six inches high. At the bottom of 

 the tube is the globose ovary, surmounted by the pin-like style 

 with the spreading stigma at the top. The five stamens are 

 attached to the walls of the tube in some flowers half-way 

 down, in others at the top. In the first form the style is very 

 long, so that the stigma comes to the top of the tube ; in the 

 second the style is short, and the stigma reaches half-way up 

 only. The flowers are consequently termed dimorphic^ and the 

 two forms are borne on separate plants. 



Though these two forms had long been known to country 

 children as " pin-eyed " and " thrum-eyed" respectively, it re- 

 mained for Charles Darwin to point out the significance of this 

 variation, which is to ensure cross-fertilization by the visits of 

 insects. A bee pushing its tongue to the bottom of a long- 

 styled flower in search for honey would have its tongue dusted 

 with pollen half-way down, and on visiting a short-styled flower 

 some of this pollen would be sure to become detached by the 

 sticky stigma at the same height ; and vice versd. The reader 

 may prove this experimentally by selecting flowers of the two 



