Life and Love. 



X. 



PLANT LIFE. 



NECESSARILY there is a great waste of re- 

 productive material among the plants, par- 

 ticularly of the pollen, and this 

 again recalls certain curious facts 

 of the lower animal life. Much 

 pollen is entirely lost, as it prob- 

 ably takes but one pollen grain 

 to fertilize each ovule ; but a 

 million grains may not be too 

 many to make certain the finding 

 of the ovule by one. The insect 

 is a sure messenger where there 

 is abundance of material ; sooner 

 or later the result of fertilization 

 will be accomplished by it, but 

 it might happen that many visits 

 would be made before pollen was 

 successfully transferred to waiting 

 stigma. 



The bee, for instance, not only 

 fails sometimes to hurry from 

 one plant to another of the same 

 kind, but is not consciously work- 

 ing for the plant at all. Her con- 



