SEDGE AND WOODRUSH. 



n 



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, a ^d 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 



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