FLOWERS : THEIR NATURE. 



65 



Sli^ft. 



Slyle. 



OvaTjf 



whidi sinks into the pistil, somewhat as a root grows down into the ground, and 

 reaches an ovule in the ovary, causing it in some unknown way to develop an 

 embryo, and thereby become a seed. 



197. As to the Pistil, we have also learned that it consists of three parts, the 

 Ovary, the Style, and the Stigma (16) ; that the style is 

 not always present, being only a stalk or support for the 

 stigma. But the two other parts are essential, — the 

 Stigma to receive the pollen, and the Ovary to contain the 

 ovules, or bodies which are to become seeds. Fig. 156 

 represents a pistil of Stonecrop, magnified ; its stigma 

 (known by the naked roughish surface) at the tip of the 

 style ; the style gradually enlarging downwards into the 

 ovary. Here the ovary is cut in two, to show some of the 

 ovules inside. And Fig. 157 shows one of the ovules, or 

 future seeds, still more magnified. 



198. Nature of the Flower. In the mind of a botanist, 

 who looks at the philosophy of the thing, 



A flower answers to a sort of Iranch. True, a flower 

 does not bear much resemblance to a common branch ; but 

 we have seen (90-109) what remarkable forms and ap- 

 pearances branches, and the leaves they bear, occasionally 

 take. Flowers come from buds just as branches do, and 

 spring from just the same places that branches do (169). 

 branch intended for a peculiar purpose. While a branch with ordinary leaves is 

 intended for growing, and for collecting from the air and preparing or digesting 

 food, — and while such peculiar branches as tubers, bulbs, &c. are for holding pre^ 

 pared food for future use, — a blossom is a very short and a special sort of branch, 

 intended for the production of seed. If the whole flower answers to a branch, 

 then it follows that (excepting the receptacle, which is a continuation of the 

 flower-stalk) — 



The parts of the flower answer to leaves. This is plainly so with the sepals and 

 the petals, which are commonly called the leaves of the blossom. The sepals or 

 calyx-leaves are commonly green and leaf-like, or partly so. And the petals or 

 corolla-leaves are leaves in shape, only more delicate in texture and in color. In 

 many blossoms, and very plainly in a White Water-Lily, the calyx-leaves run into 



In fact, a flower is a 



