The Golden Rule for Flowers 221 



pollen from a lemon will bear fruit which is partly 

 orange, partly lemon, with peel partly of the one, partly 

 of the other. 



Among the many plants visited by bees, large or 

 small, are the foxglove, mallow, and campanula, all of 

 which, though they grow pistils and stamens together, 

 ripen them at different times. Anyone not knowing 

 this, and examining a campanula blossom, would be 

 puzzled to know what could have become of the 

 stamens, for when the flower opens they have generally 

 vanished ; the pollen is there still, however, having 

 been discharged upon the stalk of the pistil before the 

 bud opened, after which the stamens shrivelled away. 

 It is caught and held by the hairs with which the stalk 

 of the pistil is clothed, apparently for the very pur- 

 pose of holding it until the bees come and carry it off. 

 When the pollen is gone, the tip of the pistil unfolds 

 from three to five spreading branches which no pollen 

 can reach while they remain folded ; and then, back 

 come the bees, this time in search of nectar, but 

 bringing with them grains of pollen in abundance from 

 other flowers. 



Some pistils, as has been said, are actually poisonedk, 

 and others unaffected by the pollen of their own sur- 

 rounding stamens. But there are others which carry 

 their likes and dislikes a point further still, and require 

 pollen, not merely from the blossoms of another plant, 

 but from blossoms whose stamens grow at exactly the 

 right height ; and if it comes from stamens too short, 

 or too long, they can make little if any use of it. 



There is, for instance, the Great Purple Loosestrife, 

 whose tall, handsome spikes of blossom light up the 



