noticed that in some flowers of the Primrose there is a small 

 spherical body, a little larger, perhaps, than a pin's head, in 

 the centre ; that in others this organ is invisible, and instead 

 we have deeply hued yellow bodies, five in number, clustering 

 together. These two varieties of the primrose are known 

 respectively as pin centres and rose centres; the same peculiarity 

 being observable in Cowslips and the garden Polyanthus. 

 The rose centre is accounted the more handsome of the two 

 and is cultivated to the exclusion of the pin centre. Now 

 what are these organs ? The little round body in the pin 

 centred specimens is the stigma, i.e. the summit of the pistil, 

 or seed-producing organ ; the "rose centres" present us with 

 the anthers, or pollen-bearing organs at the summit of the 

 stamens. But if you take a rose centred specimen and dissect 

 it, you will find the pistil inside, but reduced to about half the 

 length, thus allowing the stamens to tower above it. So if you 

 dissect a pin centre you will find stamens below. Such are 

 ihe facts to be gleaned by simple observation; what I have to 

 say now will show what is to be learned by thought and careful 

 scrutiny from these facts. You all know that no seed ever 

 arrives at perfection without the pistil being fertilized by pollen 

 scattered on it from the anthers. Now what follows from 

 this 7 By the aid of the illustration I hope to make it plain. 



We are indebted for the illustration to the courtesy of the Editor of 

 the Field Quarterly. 



