(j. M. Thomson. — On the Fertilization of Floicering Plants. ^87 



spicuous in colour. The perianth-lobes are somewhat chaffy and completely 

 re-curved, so as to expose the wide disc, covered with its secretion of honey. 

 The centre of this disc, within the stamens, has a conical stylopodium 

 destitute however of a stigma. The ovary is fairly well-developed and con- 

 tains numerous ovules, but these never seem to be fertilized, and always 

 become aborted. 



The female flowers are in a stout, rigid, and short panicle ; which is 

 very glossy and dark green in colour. The flowers have short, erect, 

 perianth-lobes and no trace of stamens. The ovary is well-developed, and 

 bears on its summit three clearly defined sessile stigmas. 



Both kinds of flower are extremely fragrant, and attract considerable 

 numbers of Diptera to them. 



Anthericum hooken is always hermaphrodite, while the much handsomer 

 A. rossii found in the Auckland and Campbell Islands is always dioecious. 

 Our species has bright yellow flowers, and is probably visited and greatly 

 aided in its fertilization by insects, but it has neither honey nor scent. The 

 stamens are somewhat proterandrous, the three opposite the outer perianth 

 lobes always so. 



On Frazer Peaks, Stewart Island, I found a very stunted form of this 

 species, tending strongly towards cleistogamy. The flowers were crowded 

 on short rigid scapes, and had their perianth-lobes so greatly reduced in 

 size as to give the racemes a pale yellowish-green hue. The stamens also 

 were greatly reduced, but the ovaries were well developed. 



Phormium tenax is another of those large open-flowered species which are 

 chiefly fertilized by birds. I have little doubt that large insects occasionally 

 visit the flowers, but they depend chiefly on the tuis and honey-birds which 

 visit them. Kakas and parakeets also aid sometimes, but the former are 

 too heavy to be welcome visitants, and most probably do more damage than 

 good. 



The flowers secrete a large amount of honey, and are distinctly proteran- 

 drous. As only the extreme tip of the style is stigmatiferous, and does not 

 become so until most of the poUen has been scattered, it is probable that the 

 flowers are not capable of self-fertilization. 



Into the modes of fertilization of the more inconspicuously-flowered 

 orders of plants I have not gone, but there is little doubt that many interest- 

 ing adaptations will be found to exist among them, and that then* close 

 examination will yield valuable results. It is a somewhat common remark 

 that little remains to be done by an original worker among our flowering 

 plants. Nothing could be more incorrect, however, than such a statement, 

 for our knowledge is extremely limited and fragmentary. It is manifestly 

 so in those respects which I have already pointed out in the earlier part of 



