228 



THE FLOWER. 



the petal and the stamen. But we could not expect to meet with 

 intermediate states between a stamen and a pistil, except as a mon- 

 strosity. The same organ could not fulfil such antagonistic offices. 

 Nevertheless, stamens changing into pistils are occasionally found in 

 monstrous blossoms. Cases of the kind are not very rare in Wil- 

 lows, where anthers are found eitlKT half changed or else perfectly 

 transformed into pistils, and bearing ovules instead of pollen. In 

 gardens some stamens of the common Poppy have been found 

 changed into perfect pistils, and imperfect attempts of the kind are 

 more frequently to be detected in the large Oriental Poppy. Two 

 Apple-trees in Ashburnham, Massachusetts, have long been known, 

 which annually produce flowers in which the petals are rejilaced by 

 five small foliaceous bodies, resembling sepals, and in place of sta- 

 mens there are ten separate and accessory pistils, inserted on the 

 throat of the calyx. 



428. This transformation of one organ into another is called 7net- 

 amorpliosis. Assuming green foliage to be the natural state of 

 leaves, the sepals and petals are said to be transformed or metamor- 

 phosed leaves ; and the stamens and pistils are still more metamor- 

 phosed, losing as they ordinarily do all appearance of leaves. Still, 

 if these organs be, as it were, leaves developed in peculiar states, 

 under the controlling agency of a power which has overborne the 

 ordinary forces of vegetation, they must always have a tendency to 



develop in their primitive form, when the 

 causes that govern the production of blossoms 

 are interfered with during their formation. 

 They may then reverse the spell, and revert 

 into some organ below them in the series, as 

 from stamens into petals, or pa<s at once into 

 the state of ordinary leaves. That is, organs 

 which from their position should be stamens 

 or pistils may develop as petals or floral 

 leaves, or else may revert at once to the state 

 of ordinary leaves. Such cases of retrograde 

 metamorphosis frequently occur in cultivated 

 flowers. 



429. Thus we often meet with the actual reconversion of what 



FIG. 345. A small leaf in pltwe of a pistil from the centre of a flower of the double Cherry. 

 346. An organ intermediate between a leaf and a pistil, from a similar ilower. 

 FIG. 347. Leaflet of a Bryophyllum, developing buds along its margins. 



