. Plant life [microform]. Botany; Botanique. IfOnE MARftlAOE CUSTOITC. 1» way cross-fertilisation is endered almost a dead certainty. Tho result of these various clever dodges IS that the orchids have b(3coine one of the dominant plant-families of tho world, and in the tropics UBurp many of the best and most favoured positions (Fig. 24). Darwin has written a moHt romantic book on the numerous devices by which orchids alone attract msects to fertilise them. I will aay no more of this family, therefore —the highest and strangest aKiong the threefold flowers —aave mwrely to advise those who wish
. Plant life [microform]. Botany; Botanique. IfOnE MARftlAOE CUSTOITC. 1» way cross-fertilisation is endered almost a dead certainty. Tho result of these various clever dodges IS that the orchids have b(3coine one of the dominant plant-families of tho world, and in the tropics UBurp many of the best and most favoured positions (Fig. 24). Darwin has written a moHt romantic book on the numerous devices by which orchids alone attract msects to fertilise them. I will aay no more of this family, therefore —the highest and strangest aKiong the threefold flowers —aave mwrely to advise those who wish to know more of this curious subject to look it up in his charming volume. Instead of pursuing the matter at issue further, I will give one final example in an opposite direction. An opposite direction, I say, because all the threefold flowers we have hitherto been considering are exa? i of a strict upward move- ment of evolution. Each group we have ex- amined has been higher and more complex than the group before it. But I will now show you an instance, if not of degeneracy, at least of extreme simplification, which yet produces in the end the best j, "ssible results. This instanc. IS that of the common English arum, known to children as cuckoo-pint or " lords and ladies " (Fig. 25).. FIO. 24.—THE TWO P0LLEN-MA88E8, VERT MUCH Please note that these images are extracted from scanned page images that may have been digitally enhanced for readability - coloration and appearance of these illustrations may not perfectly resemble the original Allen, Grant, 1848-1899. London : Hodder and Stoughton
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