HOW FLOWERS CLUB tfOGEtfHEB. 159 



cultivated in our gardens. In the simpler 

 among them, such as the sunflower, the corn- 

 marigold, the ragwort, and the golden-rod, both 

 ray-florets and central florets are simply yellow. 

 But in others, such as the daisy, the ox-eye 

 daisy, the aster, and the camomile, the ray- 

 florets differ in colour from those of the centre ; 

 the latter remain yellow, while the former 

 become white, or are tinged with pink, or even 

 flaunt forth in scarlet, crimson, blue, or purple. 

 Of this class one may mention as familiar 

 instances the dahlia, the zinnia, the Michaelmas 

 daisies, the cinerarias, and the pretty coreopsis 

 so common in our gardens. Gardeners, how- 

 ever, are not content to let us admire these 

 flowers as nature made them. They generally 

 "double" them that is to say, by carefully 

 selecting certain natural varieties, they produce 

 a form in which all the florets have at last 

 become neutral and strap- shaped. This is well 

 seen in the garden chrysanthemum, where, how- 

 ever, if you open the very centre of the doubled 

 flower-head, you will generally find in its midst 

 a few remaining fertile tubular blossoms. The 

 same process is also well seen in the various 

 stages between the single and the double dahlia. 

 Such "double" composites can set little or no 

 seed, and are therefore from the point of view of 

 the plant mere abortions. Nor are they beautiful 

 to an eye accustomed to the ground plan of floral 

 architecture. Remember, of course, that what 

 we call " a double flower " in a rose, a butter- 

 cup, or any other simple blossom is one in 

 which the stamens have been converted into 



