as in compound, and even umbelliferous flowers, to be reversed, for the pistils are invariably central, or internal, in every simple flower, and would therefore, if drawn out into a monoecious spike, be above the stamens.
Many curious contrivances of Nature serve to bring the anthers and stigmas together. In Gloriosa, Andr. Repos. t. 129, the style is bent, at a right angle from the very base, for this evident purpose. In Saxifraga, and Parnassia, Engl. Bot. t. 82, the stamens lean one or two at a time over the stigma, retiring after they have shed their pollen, and giving place to others; which wonderful œconomy is very striking in the garden Rue, Ruta gravæolens[errata 1], whose stout and firm filaments cannot be disturbed from the posture in which they may happen to be, and evince a spontaneous movement unaffected by external causes. The five filaments of the Celosia, Cock's-comb, are connected at their lower part by a membranous web, which in moist weather is relaxed, and the stamens spread for shelter under the concave lobes of the corolla. When the air is dry the con-
- ↑ Correction: gravæolens should be amended to graveolens
