38 Flashlights on Nature 



themselves on their long stalks, and catching the 

 sunlight, begin afresh to accumulate material for 

 next year's growth and next year's burning. 



But why do the tiowers want so much to reach 

 the open air at all ? Why should they not blossom 

 contentedly under the enclosing ice-sheet? A glance 

 at No. 6 will serve to explain the reason. F'lowers, 

 after all, are mere devices for the fertilisation of the 

 fruit ; it is the seeds and the next generation that the 

 plant itself is mainly thinking about. The blossoms 

 of soldanella are noticeable to us lordly human 

 beings chiefly because they are so pretty ; they 

 have a delicate blue or violet corolla, exquisitely 

 vandyked at the edge, and divided (on a closer 

 view) into five more or less conspicuous lobes ; 

 so it is their colour and their daintiness that make 

 us so much admire them. Hut to soldanella itself 

 — which, after all, has to earn its livelihood with 

 difficulty on a stern and rocky soil — this beauty 

 that charms us is a mere matter of advertisement. 

 The plant wants its blossoms to attract the early 

 spring bees and honey-sucking f^ies, which carry 

 pollen from head to head, and so fertilise its seeds 

 for it. And fertilisation, to the practical-minded 

 plant, is the whole root of the question. It cares 

 no more for the beauty of its tiowers in themselves 

 than the British manufacturer of cocoa or soap 

 cares for the gorgeous colours and striking designs 

 he lavishes on his advertisements. *' Use Jones's 

 Detergent " is the key-note of the poster. The 

 object of an advertisement is to catch the eye and 

 secure the money of customers ; the object of 



