FABLE OF THE PANSY

New Zealand Tablet, 29 October 1908, Page 38

FABLE OF THE PANSY

A pretty fable about the pansy is current among French and German children. The flower has five petals and five sepals. In most pansies, especially of the earlier and less highly developed varieties, two of the petals are' plain in color and three are gay. The two plain petals have a single sepal, two of- the gay petals have a sepal each, and the third, which is the largest of all," has two sepals. The fable is -that the,, pansy represents a family consisting of husband and wife and four daughters, two of -the latter being step-children of the wife. The plain petals are the step-children, with only one chair; the two small, gay petals are the daughters, with a chair each, and the- large gay petal is the wife, with two chairs. To find the father one must strip away the petals until the stamens and pistils are bare. They have a fanciful resemblance to an old man,- with, a flannel wrap about his neck, his shoulders upraised, and his feet in a bathtub. The story is probably of French origin, because the French" call the pansy the stepmother.