“You were going to say the bee, weren’t you?” her mother smiled. 37
“Oh yes—and would that have been right?” Elsie cried in delight.
“Yes, that would have been exactly right. If we had been near enough to examine the bee’s motions closely we should have seen that he alighted on the ovary, and then began to turn here and there in order to get at the honey at the base of each petal. As he did so he brushed off some of the pollen, for he was right in amongst the stamens, and this powdery pollen stuck to his fuzzy body and he carried it away with him.”
“But if he carried it away how could it get into the flower’s ovary?” Elsie asked, puzzled.
“It did not get into this flower’s ovary,” her mother answered. “Nature did not intend that it should, and that is why the bee is introduced. For the 38 other buttercup that he flew to, or some other one that he would visit afterward, would have its ovary ripe, and when he alighted on it in search of honey some of the pollen would be brushed off his body right into this ovary that was all ready to receive it.”
“Oh! But what would happen then? The little baby buttercups would begin to grow right away, mamma?”
“Yes, the ovary would close up and the seeds would begin to grow, very slowly. They would keep on growing until they were ripe and then they would burst their covering and fall out on the ground. Those of them that were fortunate enough to become embedded in the soil, so that they would not freeze in the winter, would come out in the spring as little plants, which would soon bring 39 forth buttercups. That is the way with the wild flowers. But with the cultivated ones, like cucumbers, apples, beans, and the like, all of those that are valuable for eating, we are careful to save the seeds and plant them where they will be safe. Instead of leaving them to chance we make a garden and plant them in it where they will be snug and warm.”
“And wouldn’t the seeds grow, or the little plants come up, if the bee hadn’t gone to the flowers, mamma?”
“No, darling, it is the bee, or some other insect, or the birds, that marry all the bright-colored plants in this way, as the wind marries the soberhued ones. Without these we should have no vegetation.”
“But, mamma, marry! Why do you say they marry? I thought only men and women married.” 40