The Daisy^s Pedigree, 



19 



The flowers consist of one, and sometimes two, 

 stamens and a pistil, growing naked out of the edge 

 of the leaf No one but a botanist could ever recog- 

 nise their nature at all, for they all look like mere 

 yellowish specks on the slender side of the green 

 frond ; but the pistil contains true seeds, and the 



Fig. 5. — Frond and flower of Duckweed. 



stamens produce true pollen, and from the botanical 

 standpoint that settles the question of their floral 

 nature at once. They are, in fact, representatives of 

 the simplest original form of flower, preserved to our 

 own day on small stagnant ponds, where the com- 

 petition of other plants does not press them hard as 

 it has pressed their congeners on dry land or in open 



