White and Greenish 



these water gardens, that serves at once as drinking fountain and 

 bath to our not over-squeamish feathered neighbors. The num- 

 ber of insects these destroy, not to mention the joy of their pres- 

 ence, would alone compensate the householder of economic bent 

 for the cost of a shallow concrete tank. 



Opening some time after six o'clock in the morning, the white 

 water lily spreads its many-petalled, deliciously fragrant, golden- 

 centered chalice to welcome the late-flying bees and flower flies, 

 the chief pollinators. Beetles, " skippers, and many other crea- 

 tures on wings alight too. " I have named two species of bees 

 (Halictus nelumbonis and Prosopis nelumbonis) on account of 

 thei* close economic relation to these flowers," says Professor 

 Robertson, who has captured over two hundred and fifty species 

 of bees near his home in Carlinville, Illinois, and described nearly a 

 third of them as new. Linnaeus, no doubt the first to conceive the 

 pretty idea of making a floral clock, drew up a list of blossoms 

 whose times of opening and closing marked the hours on its face; 

 but even Linnaeus failed to understand that the flight of insects 

 is the mainspring on which flowers depend to set the mechanism 

 going. In spite of its whiteness and fragrance, the water lily re- 

 quires no help from night-flying insects in getting its pollen trans- 

 ferred; therefore, when the bees and flies rest from their labors 

 at sundown, it may close the blinds of its shop, business being 

 ended for the day. 



" When doctors disagree, who shall decide?" It is contended 

 by one group of scientists that the water lily, which shows the 

 plainest metamorphosis of some sort, has developed its stamens 

 from petals just the reverse of Nature's method, other botanists 

 claim. A perfect flower, we know, may consist of only a stamen 

 and a pistil, the essential organs, all other parts being desirable, 

 but of only secondary importance. Gardeners, taking advantage 

 of a wild flower's natural tendency to develop petals from sta- 

 mens and to become " double," are able to produce the magnifi- 

 cent roses and chrysanthemums of to-day; and so it would seem 

 that the water lily, which may be either self-fertilized or cross- 

 fertilized by pollen-carriers in its present state of development, is 

 looking to a more ideal condition by increasing its attractiveness 

 to insects as it increases the number of its petals, and by econo- 

 mizing pollen in transforming some of the superfluous stamens 

 into petals. 



Scientific speculation, incited by the very fumes of the student 

 lamp, may weary us in winter, but just as surely is it dispelled 

 by the fragrance of the lilies in June. Then, floating about in a 

 birch canoe among the lily-pads, while one envies the very 

 moose and deer that may feed on fare so dainty and spend their 

 lives amid scenes of such exquisite beauty, one lets thought also 

 float as idly as the little clouds high overhead. 



175 



