312 
THE GARDENERS' CHRONICLE OF AMERICA 
of the plants to dew them over morning and evening with 
clean water; then, later in the season, should a period of 
drought come, water in copious quantity may be neces- 
sary. This is readily applied through a fine rose attached 
either to the water-pot where the area is small, or in- 
serted in the garden hose where is is extensive. The 
water must be kept continually on the move, so as not to 
wash the soil from the joints. It may, however, be noted 
that watering is rarely necessary with plants in estab- 
lished walls, and should only be resorted to when the 
plants begin to exhibit clear signs of distress. 
In the method of arranging plants in dry walls there 
is ample scope for artistic taste, and here it is that pictur- 
esque combinations of leaf and flower produce endless 
pleasure and admit of variations to which there is prac- 
tically no limit. 
Bees and Flowers 
IK the economy of nature, the subject of the relation of 
bees to horticulture is so great that I can only give 
a brief outline of it in this article. 
We know that bees gather nectar from the blossoms, 
but it is not known generally why their wants are supplied 
by the floral world. The answer to this reveals to us a 
new meaning for the existence of these insects. 
Plant blossom in order that seed may be produced, and 
the race continued. Before seed can be produced pollen 
borne by anthers must be placed on certain special parts 
called the stigma ; should the pollen be of a suitable kind, 
and the stigma in a receptive condition, i. e., adhesive, 
when the pollen comes into contact, then a delicate thread 
called the pollen tube is thrown out by the pollen granule 
which forms a connection with the seed vessel by which 
the seed becomes fertilized, and when mature capable of 
germination. 
If we examine a flower we shall find generally just with- 
in its corolla, the productive organs ; they consist of sta- 
mens and pistil. Stamens are slender filaments carrying 
little knobs at their extremities called anthers which bear 
pollen ; these are the male organs, while the female organs 
consist of the ovary containing the ovules or undeveloped, 
and one or more threadlike styles arising from it, each 
terminating with fleshy stigma. 
The great majority of flowers possess both anthers and 
stigmas, thus carrying both sexes on the same flower. 
This would lead us to suppose the transmission of pollen 
was secure ; but it is not so, for we know that conspicuous 
flowers, generally speaking, are especially arranged to 
prevent or impede fertilizaton by pollen, which they them- 
selves produce, while marvelous contrivances are found 
to secure pollen from some other flower, off a plant of the 
same species, by the agency of bees. Nature protests 
against inbreeding in plants no less than animals, in flow- 
ers as well as bees. 
Sprengel was able to show by far the larger number 
of flowering plants confide to insects the duty of bring- 
ing about these unions, which without them would never 
be accomplished. Of the whole insect agency the honey 
bee stands at the head of the list and fertilizes about 90 
per cent., and is par excellence the complement of the 
blossom. For in spring when fruit trees are in bloom 
there are 20 bees visiting the flowers to one of any other 
kind of insects, the flowers offering them pollen and nec- 
tar in the most attractive form. We thus see that pollen 
is necessary to both flowers and bees, and is borne in such 
profusion that the surplus goes as a flesh-forming food 
for the bees. 
The position of nectaries in flowers differs ; while some 
lie on the surface, others are found in deep recesses ; this 
insures the bees coining well into contract with the male 
and female parts, but the sexes don't always exist in the 
same flower, and many flowers in which both do exist 
prevent self-fertilization by maturing these organs the 
one before the other. 
The proterandrous plants are those in which the anthers 
ripen first ; for example, if we examine a nasturtim flower 
we find the nectar secreted in a long spur. When the 
flower first opens the style is short and immature, and the 
anthers mature one after the other, the process occupying 
from three to seven days, during this time the flower is 
in function only male : the anthers now fade and drop off, 
when the style grows longer and the pistil with the stigma 
adhesive and receptive assumes its proper position to re- 
ceive the pollen from the powdered breast of a bee, car- 
ried from a younger to this older flower. 
Proterogynous plants are a class the reverse of the last ; 
for example, the apple, strictly a fusion of five fruits and 
requires no less than five separate fertilizations for its per- 
fect production. It sometimes happens that one or two 
of the stigmas are not fertilized for want of insect agency 
and the fruit on one side is deformed. If such an apple 
be cut across it will be found the undeveloped part lies 
where the pip is shriveled. 
Among the plum growers of the British Isles it is found 
that the pollen of other kinds is more prepotent ; so much 
so, they have made it a study to have various kinds in 
bloom at the same time. 
Monoecious plants are those which have the genders in 
different flowers of the same plant, such as melons, cu- 
cumbers, marrow, etc. 
Dicoccous plants are the class that have the genders 
placed on separate plants, a good example of this we have 
in the common early-flowering Willow on roadsides 
where the yellow flowers are covered with pollen and the 
dull gray flowers have nectar to attract bees ; we thus see 
that bees, both being vitally dependent on each other, and 
both by their agency contributing towards the support of 
mankind. 
Anemophilous plants are a class that bear inconspcu- 
ous flowers, have large quantities of pollen, no nectar, and 
are wholly fertilized by the wind. This includes all kinds 
of grasses, tomatoes and others. 
I would here remark that in some varieties of straw- 
berries there is a tendency to a separation of the sexes ; 
those bearing large flowers are frequently tending to be- 
come male, to produce few fruits, and a great many run- 
ners, while the same variety with small flowers, all tend- 
ing to become female, are abundant bearers and to pro- 
duce few runners. If we look at a strawberry we find 
that it requires from 200 to 300 distinct fertilizations for 
its perfect production, each berry being composed of that 
number of drupels, i. e., little lobes of fruit, each having 
a female. 
In one raspberry there are about 90 male anthers and 
60 to 70 drupels, each carrying a female stigma, while on 
the receptacle will be seen a ring of shining dots of nectar. 
It thus requires 60 to 70 distinct fertilizations to perfect 
each fruit, otherwise the fruit does not develop, but in 
some parts remains green and hard. 
