, 1909-10-30

kOkL VI bAO RCAACb oI
are little fat stars, each having three %orstour
ray springing from the cen re. These rays may
perhaps help them to hold on to the stigma.
Too much Importance must not be attached
to this point, however, for pollen grains have
many various forms, and il a near relative of
the vervuin, where the same eviction process
takes place, the pollen grains have the form
of minute eggs.
The ovules contained in the long ovary,
after being fe~rtilized in one of the two ways
above described, grow into tiny black nut
let's, and there they remain embedded in
the thick stalk of the flower. How can such
seeds be distributed? This seemed to the
present writer a pretty stiff problem whom
he first gave his attention to 1t. Here was
a thick heavy stalk, not at Nil likely to be
blown about by the wind, while the seeds
were hidden away inside, unprovided with
hooks, or barbs or gum, to attach them
selves to wan lering creatures, while it was
plain that the cattle refused to eat the plant.
For q long time the problem remained
unsOlved, till one day the writer, strolliug
over a pasture, noticed that a large number
of the stalks of the vervains had dried up.
Here perhaps was the solution. The ami
mails, though disliking the green plant,
might find the stalks when converted into a
hID1 y u my HCC6pGdUlS, VIZ tIIl5 pIOFSu 10
be the case, for an examination of the said
stalks soon showed that a good many had
been nibbled off. That discovery made it
clear that the vervain's mode of securing the
dispersion of its seeds is after all Oh excel
lent one, and we no longer wonder that we
find it to be one of the COmmJnest of our
weeds.
Only a weed, but is it not nevertheless
worth q little of OUT attention.
In view of the remarkable news about
the planet Mars in Thursdays kilograms.
o few words concerning it may be
acceptable to some Of our readers. The
planet may be seen here every evening in
the eastern part of the heavens as a bright
reddish star. At the same time the planet
Venus may be seen in the west, q lovely
diamond in the evening sky.
Our own planet. this grand and beautiful
earth on which we live, goes round the sun
in a path Tor orbit) that lies between the
path Of Venus and the path of Mars, the first
being therefore,in relation to the sun, inside,
the latter outside the earth.
1t is not surprising that as soon as it came
to be understood that the planets, including
our own earth, were great balls, oil lighted
by the sun, all revolving about him and
III 1OLuGlnS On CASlA w hAShs men SuOllQ
begin to speculate on the chances of the
other planets being, like our own, the
seats of life and possibly OF intelligent
life, somewhat like that of mankind. We
aus is nearly as large as our earth, but
Mars has a diameter little more than half
that OF the earth or about double that of our
moon. The discovery that both Venus
and Mars are surrounded by an atmosphere
the latter. however, being very light, seems
to favour the view that there neay be life on
those planets,
Mars, at his nearest, is So millions of
miles away from us, yet there are astron-
omers who believe they have found evil
dence that the planet is inhabited,
and they have arrived at that conclusion
from all examination of those markings Of
its surface which TIE telegram tells us have
now been obliterated by a "yellow veiE" y
What are the markings? They are lines
running in various directions over the plan
cts surface, and commonly called canals.
The existence of such markings is certain,
but their cause remains obscure, a few as
tronomers being inclined to look upon them
as the artificial productions of intelligent
beings From Professor Todd's, "New Astron-