226 THE FAIRY-LAND OF SCIENCE. 
but after the anthers are empty and shrivelled the 
stalk of the stigma grows longer, and it falls lower 
clown. By-and-by another bee, having pollen on 
her back, comes to look for honey, and as she goes 
into No. 3, she rubs against the stigma and leaves 
upon it the dust from another flower. 
Tell me, has not the Salvia, while remaining so 
much the same shape as the dead-nettle, devised a 
wonderful contrivance to make use of the visits of the 
bee ? 
The common sweet violet ( Viola odoratd) or the dog 
violet (Viola canina], which you can gather in any 
meadow, give up their pollen-dust in quite a different 
way from the Salvia, and yet it is equally ingenious. 
Everyone has noticed what an irregular shape this 
flower has, and that one of its purple petals has a 
curious spur sticking out behind. In the tip of this 
spur and in the spur of the stamen lying in it the 
violet hides its honey, and to reach it the bee must 
press past the curious ring of orange-tipped bodies in 
the middle of the flower. These bodies are the anthers 
a a, Fig. 61, which fit tightly round the stigma s, so that 
when the pollen-dust /, which is very dry, comes out 
of the bags, it remains shut in by the tips as if in a 
box. Two of these stamens have spurs which lie in 
the coloured spur of the flower, and have honey at the 
end of them. Now, when the bee shakes the end of 
the stigma s, it parts the ring of anthers, and the fine 
dust falls through upon the insect. 
Let us see for a moment how wonderfully this flower 
is arranged to bring about the carrying of the pollen, 
as Sprengel pointed out years ago. In the first place, 
