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JOURNAL OF THE ROYAL HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



is that the ovary is superior and free in Lilies, and inferior and 

 adnate to the perianth in Amaryllids. 



When we examine a Daffodil flower, we find some few hints as 

 to the way in which it has gradually developed from a star-shaped 

 into a tubular blossom. The six perianth divisions are now adnate 

 for half-an-inch to one inch above the ovary, and then fly off as 

 it were at a tangent, when they become free, — becoming free in 

 the earlier and greener-flowered Daffodils much sooner than in 

 the more highly developed and specialised true Narcissi. Then 

 comes the question of the corona or trumpet. Why it is de- 

 veloped we do not know, but its function seems to be the shelter 

 of the pollen-bearing anthers, and it also acts as an advertise- 

 ment to the occasional insect visitors, which undoubtedly 

 cross-fertilise or hybridise these flowers. Lindley, Gay, Dr. 

 Masters, Mr. W. G. Smith, and others, have tried to unravel the 

 developmental mysteries of the corona. Some thought it com- 

 posed of an outer whorl of aborted stamens, others suggested 

 the idea of stipules ; but to-day we call it " an outgrowth from 

 the tubular portion of the flower," borne or carried upwards by 

 a sort of intercalary axile development at its base, and not to be 

 confounded with the cups of Eucharis, Ismene, Pancratium, or 

 Hymenocallis, which are formed by the cohesion of the thickened 

 bases of both aborted and fertile stamens. This formation of a 

 protective and attractive corona or trumpet by the Narcissi and 

 the genera Cryptostephanus, Placea, and Tapeinanthus is pecu- 

 liar, since most flowers adopt other, and apparently more simple, 

 methods of protecting their pollen. Cyrtanthus joins its seg- 

 ments into a long drooping tube ; a Fuchsia makes an umbrella 

 of its outspread petals ; a Tulip stares up into the sunshine, but, 

 like the Crocus, closes on the chilly approach of rain. But a 

 Daffodil seems to have made a tubular corona, which failed in 

 its purpose until it was turned upside down — " all the top at the 

 bottom," as one may say. Held erect, and without the power 



LlLIACEiE. 



AMARYLLIDACE JE . 



