CHAPTER VII 



FLOWERS 



94. What is a flower ? A little has been said in Chapter II 

 about the structure and work of the flower, but it will be 

 necessary in the present chapter to take up these matters 



somewhat more 

 in detail. First 

 may come the 

 question as to 

 what a flower 

 really is ; that is 

 I ^Stamen to say, to what 

 -> Pistil O ther organs of 

 a plant the parts 

 of a flower cor- 

 respond. Put in 

 more technical 

 language, this 

 question would 

 be, What is the 

 morphology of 

 the flower ? 



A flower is a specialized and highly modified branch or shoot 

 for reproduction of the plant. If this is true, then the sepals 

 or divisions of the calyx, petals or divisions of the corolla, 

 stamens, and pistils (Fig. 90) must represent leaves. It 

 would take too much space to present here the evidence of 

 the branch-like nature of the flower. Much of this evidence 

 rests upon the study of the lower plants, and especially on 

 the investigation of the steps by which the higher kinds 'of 

 plants have in the course of ages been developed from these. 



104 



FIG. 90. The floral organs of alpine azalea (Loiseleuria) 



A good example of a flower in which the floral organs do not 

 all spring separately from a knob-like receptacle. Here the 

 calyx is very slightly and the corolla decidedly bell-shaped. 

 The stamens are distinct from each other, but the pistil is 

 single and represents several united carpels. A, an exterior 

 view ; B, a lengthwise section of the flower. After H. Miiller 



