74 Field, Forest, and Wayside Flowers 
devote all their energies to the production of 
pollen, and sometimes they have only a pistil or 
pistils, and attempt nothing else except the per- 
fecting of their own seed. 
The perfect blossoms which bear both stamens 
and pistils may live in a household of staminate 
brother-flowers, or in a household of pistillate 
sister-flowers, or all three sorts of blossoms may 
grow together on one tree. 
The red maple and the elm among early-flower- 
ing trees, and the holly, prickly-ash, and hackberry 
among the later trees, are thus unsystematic in 
their mode of conducting their affairs. 
Their seedlings are born by the crossing of two 
flowers, or by the crossing of two trees, as cir- 
cumstances may determine. 
The seedling born of two flowers has a double 
advantage over the one which springs from a seed 
set by aid of pollen from the flower in which it 
grew. The offspring of two flower-parents is the 
stronger, and also the readier to accommodate 
itself to change in its circumstances and surround- 
ings. It is therefore likely to live to maturity, 
and to bear many flowers, which will take after 
their ‘‘ forbears’’ in a decided inclination to pro- 
duce pollen in one blossom and seeds in another. 
