Excerpt from A Reader in Botany: Part II, Flower and Fruit, Selected and Adapted From Well-Known Authors As the flower is upright and is quite large, rain drops must fall into it when it rains. But the drops cannot reach the nectar and mingle with it, because they are held back by the hairs, just as a drop of perspiration flowing over a man's fore head Is held back by the eyebrows and eyelashes from running into the eyes. An insect, however, is not in the least hindered by these hairs from reaching the nectar. I now examined other flowers and found that many of them had some thing in their structure which seemed to answer the same purpose. The more I studied the sub ject, the more plainly I saw that those flowers which contain nectar are so constructed that while the insects can easily reach it, the rain cannot destroy it. I therefore concluded that the nectar was secreted for the sake of the insects, and that it was protected against the rain in order that they might enjoy it pure and uninjured. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.