SEDGE AND WOODRUSH. 19 



the pistil ; and to them the pollen-grains are 

 blown from other surrounding blossoms, 

 already fully opened. As soon as the seeds 

 have thus been impregnated, the little plumes 

 wither away, and then the petals, which have 

 hitherto covered the stamens, open imme- 

 diately, releasing the stamens, as you see 

 them in the first head I plucked. The pollen 

 blown from them falls upon some other 

 flower still in the bud ; and so each head as 

 it opens fertilises in turn its unopened neigh- 

 bours. You can gather lots of them here in 

 every stage of blossoming, from the first 

 receptive period with hanging plumes and 

 tightly covered stamens, to the last distri- 

 butive period with open petals and stamens 

 shedding freely their golden pollen-grains. 



This pretty nodding sedge, on the other 

 hand, shows us another way of solving the 

 self-same problem how to prevent the 

 pollen from falling upon the pistil of its own 

 blossom. The sedge has done it very 

 simply, by putting all the stamens in one 



c 2 



