256 THE BIOCOSMOS PARTICULARIZED. 



sunflower, the chrysanthemum, the dandelion, 

 the thistle, etc.; each manifests the underly- 

 ing principle in its way, according to its own 

 individuality the petulant thistle always 

 ready for a fight with swords drawn, the flaunt- 

 ing sunflower always begging for a caress 

 from its sun-god, the modest daisy quite 

 shrinking from a glance into the admirer's 

 face. Yet all of them are associated, having 

 many florets in the one flower. Indeed just 

 this association gives a vast new field for the 

 development of floral individuality; there is 

 no telling what new forms and new characters 

 may be developed from such a floral associ- 

 ative power. For relatively this act has just 

 begun, the confederacy of flowers has but re- 

 cently appeared in the Plant-world. 



It is agreed by botanists that the Com- 

 posites are the youngest of the Angiosperms, 

 which have been already designated as the 

 youngest of the Cormophytes; that is, the 

 last plants to flower, in the movement of the 

 geologic ages, are just now the flowering 

 plants (Angiosperms), and the most recent 

 birth of the latter is the Composite flower. 

 Again the comparison will come up : the asso- 

 ciation of men into the federal State is so far 

 the final outcome and crown of the political 

 evolution of historic time; in a similar man- 

 ner the evolution of the floral world has 



