Hammond's dark brown wallflowers, were allowed to seed
themselves--that is, were allowed to drop and sow their own seed year
after year--do you know what would happen? They would gradually revert
or turn back to their original form and colour. The flowers would become
mixed in colour and less fine in size; at last they would be simple wild
flowers again.
[Illustration: PANSY.]
Now it is June, and the blossoms of the Wallflower have faded and
fallen. The old wall is, however, growing gay with another plant--the
Red Valerian. We must be careful to remember that it is the Red
Valerian, for there are other valerians. There is the Great Valerian
which does not grow on walls or rocks, but in damp and shady places; its
flowers are pale pink.
The blossoms of the Red Valerian on the wall are bright crimson, and
they grow in rows on small stems which spring from a stout stalk a foot
or two in height. Each blossom of five petals forms a little tube or
corolla. The base or foot of each little tube appears as a point on the
under side of the flower stem; the Red Valerian, like the Violet, is a
spurred flower.
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