A VERY INTELLIGENT PLANT 275 



and kissing, as the old saw says, is never out of 

 fashion. 



I have said above that gorse protects itself 

 against flying insects. But not indiscriminately. 

 It is a respecter of persons. While it wishes 

 to keep off the egg-laying and flower-gnawing 

 types, it wishes to attract and allure the honey- 

 suckers and fertilisers. For this object alone 

 it produces its bright yellow petals and its deli- 

 cious, nutty perfume, which hangs so sweetly on 

 the air in warm April weather. And I know 

 few things in plant life more instructive and 

 interesting to observe than the way of a bee with 

 this flower. Go out and watch it, and verify my 

 statements. When the blossom first opens, it 

 looks somewhat as in No. 9, only that the keel, 

 as we call the lower part of the flower, is not half 

 open, as there, but firmly locked together above 

 the stamens on its upper edges. This keel, as you 

 may note in No. 10, consists of two petals slightly 

 joined together at the margin. On either side of 

 it come two other petals, which we call the wings, 

 and which are fitted with a funny little protuber- 

 ance at their base so arranged that it locks the 

 whole lower part of the blossom together. This 

 mechanism cannot be seen in the illustrations, 

 nor indeed can it be properly understood except 

 in action ; but gorse is so universal a plant that 

 most of my readers can observe it and examine 

 it for themselves at leisure. The upper petal 

 of all, known as the standard, has no special duty 

 to perform save that of advertisement. It attracts 



