100 HETEBOSTYLED DIMORPHIC PLANTS. Chap. Iir. 



short-styled plants of the two preTious species appa- 

 rently eyince some slight capacity for fertilisation with 

 their own-form pollen, these three capsules may have 

 been the product of self-fertilisation. 



Besides the three species now described, the yellow- 

 flowered L. corymhifermn is certainly heterostyled, 

 as is, according to Planchon,* L. salsoloides. This 

 botanist is the only one who seems to have inferred 

 that heterostylism might have some important func- 

 tional bearing. Dr. Alefeld, who has made a special 

 study of the genus, saysf that about half of the sixty- 

 five species known to him are heterostyled. This is 

 the case with L. trigynwm, which differs so much from 

 the other species that it has been formed by him into 

 a distinct genus4 According to the same author, 

 none of the species which inhabit America and the 

 Cape of Good Hope are heterostyled. 



I have examined only three homostyled species, 

 namely, L. usitatisdmwn, a/ngustifoliwm, and caiha/rti- 

 ewm. I raised 111 plants of a variety of the first-named 

 species, and these, when protected under a net, all 

 produced plenty of seed. The flowers, according to 

 H. Miiller,§ are frequented by bees and moths. With 

 respect to L. caiharticvm, the same author shows that 

 the flowers are so constructed that they can freely 

 fertilise themselves ; but if visited by insects they 

 might be cross-fertilised. He has, however, only once 

 seen the flowers thus visited during the day ; but it 



♦Hooker's 'London Journal of Journal of Botany,' 1848, yol. 



+ ?g^t^ 7^V^°'- ." «P\^^*Vc.. ^"- P- 525) to be provided with 



io«Q oo?^^°^' ^^P*- ^^^^' "staminibus exsertis;" another 



X«bd,p. 2S1. ■with"stylisBtaminibus longiori- 



; It IS not improbable that the bus," and another has " stamina 



allied genus, Hngonia, la hetero- 5, majora, stylos longe superantia." 



fw p1u!?f "".r/P^^'f^.T" "f^*^ « '^'^ Befruchtung der Blu- 



by Planchon (Hooker's ' London men,' &o., p. 168. 



