The Golden Rule for Flowers 217 



stand a good chance of receiving pollen from the last 

 of the former. 



That the work thus done by bees is in many cases 

 absolutely indispensable there is ample proof, though 

 we may not always recognise it. 



The bean-crop failed in Nicaragua just for lack of 

 the right sort of bee ; and often when the young goose- 

 berries, or what should be gooseberries, wither and 

 drop in early spring, instead of swelling as they ought 

 to do, it is not so much because they have been nipped 

 by the frost as that the frost has kept the bees at home. 

 For the pollen and pistils of the gooseberry-blossoms 

 ripen at different times, so that the one must be brought 

 to the other if the ovules are to be fertilized ; and if 

 this is not done, neither they nor the berry containing 

 them can grow to their proper size. 

 , One year there was a remarkable scarcity of holly- 

 berries in different parts of the country, which some 

 people thought was accounted for by the cold weather 

 in the early part of the year. But the holly is a very 

 hardy shrub, and grows in Norway as far north as 62°, 

 so that it was not likely to have suffered from an 

 English spring. On the other hand, bees were re- 

 markably rare that season ; and, as the holly grows its 

 stamens and pistils mostly on different plants, the 

 dearth of berries was doubtless owing to the absence 

 of bees. 



For, though holly-blossoms are insignificant, they 

 are fertilized chiefly by bees, and not by wind, pollen 

 having been observed by Mr. Darwin on many pistil- 

 tips, which must have been brought from a tree sixty 

 yards away, and could not have been conveyed 



