The Golden Rule for Flowers 223 



just at the same height, are five stamens standing up 

 like teeth, the stalks being so very short that they are 

 almost all anther. In spite of their shortness, how- 

 ever, the stamens are on a level with the long pistil of 

 the other blossom, for they are attached to the flower 

 tube ; and for the long pistil their pollen is intended. 

 The pollen grains of the stamens which grow with the 

 long pistil — but out of sight, half-way down the tube — 

 are intended for the short pistil, whose knob is just at 

 their own level, and, accordingly, they are smaller. 



All flowers which vary in this way, all which are 

 distinguished by colour, scent, size, or irregularity of 

 shape, are mainly indebted for fertilization to insects. 

 This is the case with all bell-shaped and tubular 

 flowers, also with the snap-dragon and foxgloves, and 

 with the dead nettles, lavender, thyme, and all 

 blossom of similar shape to these, besides many others. 

 In some the shapes of the blossom and of the insect 

 by which it is fertilized are as beautifully and ' exactly 

 fitted one to the other as the lock is to the key,' and in 

 others there are endless different devices for securing 

 that the visitor shall not. depart without doing some 

 service in return for the pollen or nectar which it has 

 consumed or carried off. 



In the common stinging nettle the four stamens lie 

 folded down flat until they are touched, when they 

 spring suddenly up and scatter their pollen ; a needle 

 inserted in the throat of the common purple lucerne 

 causes two stamens instantly to start up like a jack-in- 

 the-box, the anthers at the same time exploding and 

 discharging their dust. A similar explosion takes 

 place in the flpwers of the whin and in many others. 



