as the first to exalt the
flower from the mere status of a botanical specimen.

This philosophic observer was far in advance of his age, and to his long
and arduous researches--a basis built upon successively by Andrew
Knight, Koehlreuter, Herbert, Darwin, Lubbock, Mueller, and others--we owe
our present divination of the flowers.

In order to fully appreciate this present contrast, it is well to
briefly trace the progress, step by step, from the consideration of the
mere anatomical and physiological specimen of the earlier botanists to
the conscious blossom of to-day, with its embodied hopes, aspirations,
and welcome companionships.

Most of my readers are familiar with the general construction of a
flower, but in order to insure such comprehension it is well, perhaps,
to freshen our memory by reference to the accompanying diagram (Fig. 2)
of an abstract flower, the various parts being indexed.

[Illustration: Fig. 2]

The calyx usually encloses the bud, and may be tubular, or composed of
separate leaves or sepals, as in a rose. The corolla, or colored
portion, may consist of several petals, as in the rose, or of a single
one, as in the morning-glory. At the centre is the pistil, one or more,
which forms the ultimate fruit. The pistil is divided into three parts,
ovary, style, and stigma. Surrounding the pistil are the stamens, few or
many, the anther at the extremity containing the powdery pollen.

Although these physiological features have been familiar to observers
for thousands of years, the several functions involved were scarcely
dreamed of until within a comparatively recent period.

In the writings of ancient Greeks and Romans we find suggestive
references to sexes in flowers, but it was not until the close of the
seventeenth century that the existence of sex was generally recognized.

[Illustration: Fig. 3]

In 1682 Nehemias Grew announced to the scientific world that it was
necessary for the pollen of a flower to reach the stigma or summit of
the pistil in order to insure the fruit. I have indicated his claim
pictorially at A (Fig. 3), in the series of historical progression. So
radical was this "theory" considered that it precipitated a lively
discussion among the wiseheads, which was prolonged for fifty years, and
only finally settled by Linnaeus, who reaffirmed the facts declared by
Grew, and verified them by such absolute proof that no further doubts
could be entertained. The inference of these