18 



chlor()i)hyl has dissolved into its components, or tiiey may 

 appear while the decomposition is taking place or after- 

 wards, or the yellow principle may vanish with the chloro- 

 phyl and so never develop. The red coloring matter suf- 

 fusing the green or the yellow petal or leaf produces a 

 scarlet or a darker shade, precisely as the mixing of artists' 

 pigments would do. Therefore it is apparent that when a 

 chlorophyl green is the foundation, the first color to follow 

 is not restricted to yellow, but may be red, purple, or blue. 

 There are other yellows, however, or at least of a differ- 

 ent origin, which are developed from a pure white founda- 

 tion. These are seen in Lonicera longijiora, garden bush, 

 pole and Lima beans, many orchids, and in a less degree in 

 tuberose, jasmine, etc., which become yellowish by age, 

 and in Fungi. 



We know furthermore, by the examples heretofore given 

 of Cypripedium and Angrtecum, that some greens do not 

 become yellow at all, l)ut they gradually and sometimes very 

 slowly indeed, as in LapiKieriu alha^ fade evenly away to a 

 pure white ! * 



Therefore not only a yellow and a green color, but for 

 that matter any color, to use a popular ex[)ression, may fade 

 out to a pure white, as we may have occasion to show. 



The writer has not yet Ijeen so fortunate as to have seen 

 the original statement of De Candolle regarding color. If 

 his oft quoted "xanthic and cyanic series" referred to spe- 

 cies of flowers, each of these divisions would contain the 

 most heterogenous assembly of flowers imaginable, and such 

 an arrangement could hardly be conceivable of a botanist of 

 his intelligence ; he doubtless referred merely to the evolu- 

 tion of color as a separate and indei)endent featui'e of 

 flowers, such a division l)eing not inappropriate, for, intleed, 

 with com})aratively few exceptions, all hues might be com- 

 prised in these two series to which we have already alludetl ; 



* See LapaEjeria alba aud otliers iu the list, Chapter IX. 



