Mr. Thomas Meehan exhibited flowers of Helianthus mollis, and remarked on the popular fallacy of sun-flowers turning with the sun. The original "sunflower" connected with the Ovidian stories of Clyde and Phoebus, was the European Heliotrope, and even that did not turn with the sun in the modern popular sense. It simply grew where the sun loved to shine, and the plant did not flower till the sun had reached its summer solstice. The mythological story is founded on the fact that the plant continued to open its flowers as the sun declined, or, as Ovid might say, its affection for its beloved was in proportion as the lover fled from her to his winter quarters. The Helianthus was named sunflower simply because the flowers resembled the sun, and there is no relation between it and the sun-flower of mythology.

Yet there are peculiarities worth noting. Travelers across the American plains, where sun-flowers abound, have often observed a great proportion of flowers facing one direction, but there were always some in others, and these exceptions seemed to prevent any generalizations as to special points of the compass being favored more than others.

He has growing in his garden plants of Helianthus mollis, from seeds gathered by him some years ago from near Odin, in Illinois, and the flowers always seemed to have, to a great extent, a general southern leaning, but until this season he had not thought to make exact figures early enough tobe satisfactory. This season he found the first flowers open on the 7th of August. The upper portion of the flower stalk is curved, so that when the flower opens some quarter of an inch of stem is at right angles with the lower portion, and the face of the flower is exactly horizontal. It was subsequently found that the flower remained in this horizontal position till the last disk-floret had expanded, occupying about three days, when the whole head commenced to take an erect position, taking about three days more to fully accomplish. Commencing to open on the 7th of August, by the 11th there were sixty-eight flowers expanded, all facing exactly southeast on opening, but on the evening of this day three were found which had changed round to northeast, with a slight tendency up from the horizon. On the 14th there were seventy-three flowers open, twenty-one of which faced northeast.

On examining the matter carefully the inclination to the north was found to be due to a slight spiral or uncoiling growth during the advance from the horizontal rest to the erect position. All do not do this, but uncurve rather than uncoil. While this accounted for the northward advance, often as much as ninety degrees in so many flowers, it still left the reason for the original facing of the flower to the southeast among the many problems of plant life yet to be solved.

He referred to the several reasons offered in explanation of polarity in the leaves of the compass plant, pointing out the unsatisfactory character of all of them.