etached condition, how incomprehensible and
grotesque do they appear! And yet, when viewed at home, in their
bell-shaped corollas, their hospitable expression and greeting are seen
to be quite as expressive and rational as those of the sage. Take the
mountain-laurel, for instance; what a singular exhibition is this which
we may observe on any twilight evening in the laurel copse, the dense
clusters of pink-white bloom waited upon by soft-winged fluttering
moths, and ever and anon celebrating its cordial spirit by a mimic
display of pyrotechnics as the anthers hurl aloft their tiny showers of
pollen!

Every one is familiar with the curious construction of this flower, with
its ten radiating stamens, each with its anther snugly tucked away in a
pouch at the rim of its saucer-shaped corolla. Thus they appear in the
freshly opened flower, and thus will they remain and wither if the
flower is brought indoors and placed in a vase upon our mantel. Why?
Because the hope of the blossom's life is not fulfilled in these
artificial conditions; its natural counterpart, the insect, has failed
to respond to its summons.

[Illustration]

But the twilight cluster in the woods may tell us a pretty story.

Here a tiny moth hovers above the tempting chalice, and now settles upon
it with eager tongue extended for the nectar at its centre. What an
immediate and expressive welcome! No sooner has this little feathery
body touched the filaments than the eager anthers are released from
their pockets, and, springing inwards, clasp their little visitor, at
the same time decorating him with their compliments of webby pollen (A,
Fig. 5).

The nectary now drained of its sweets, the moth creeps or flutters to a
second blossom, and its pollen-dusted body thus coming in contact with
its stigma, cross-fertilization is accomplished. The pollen of the
laurel differs from that of most of the Heath blooms, its grains being
more or less adherent by a cobwebby connective which permeates the mass
as indicated in my magnified representation (B, Fig. 5).

[Illustration: Fig. 5]

It is probable that an accessory cross-fertilization frequently results
from a mass of the pollen falling directly upon the stigma of a
neighboring blossom, or even upon its own stigma, but even in the
latter case, as has been absolutely demonstrated as a general law by the
experiments of Darwin, the pollen from a separate flower is almost
invariably prepotent, and leads to the m