The Ovules
WHEN the ovules get ready to grow, the flower prepares to bloom.
All about the ovules the delicate walls of the ovary shut tightly.
The white filaments of the stamens group themselves about it; you cannot see the ovary, they stand so close to it.
Their anther cells reach halfway up to the stigma, for the white stigma stands above the anthers.
The anthers and the stigma are there for the sake of the ovules.
But this is not all.
A delicate corolla of bright colors surrounds the stamens and pistil. It holds them in its white tube, and spreads the bright border out wide for the bees to see and come to the help of the ovules.
But this is not all.
The green calyx wraps its sepals about the end of the corolla tube, and when the corolla falls the calyx covers nicely the ovary and helps it protect the ovules.
But this is not all.
When the bees have been and have left their message of life, and when the corolla has faded and fallen, the stems of the flowers turn down and hide the ovary with its seedlets under the leaves.
But this is not all.
The leaves work day and night to make food for the plant, and some of it goes to the ovules. The leaves eat what is in the air and change it to food for the rest of the plant and the ovules.
But this is not all.
The roots suck food from the hard earth; they help the leaves make food.
But this is not all.
The stems carry the food from the roots to the leaves, and from the leaves to the flowers, where it gets to the ovules.
Why should so much be done for the sake of the tiny ovules, white little atoms at the heart of the flower?
