ON THE SEED OF MAGNOLIA. 243 
. agreeing with it in its all but inferior ovary, its large epigynous gland, 
its pyramidal style, its petals broad at the base, and, according to my 
observation, decidedly valvate, and these latter and the stamens being 
early deciduous. In addition to the characters just mentioned, the 
anatropal ovule of Bursinopetalum is pendulous from near the apex of 
the cell of the ovary; the seed is completely adnate with the tube of 
the calyx, and crowned with its persistent teeth and the scar of the 
large epigynous gland; the articulations of the branches of the in- 
florescence are constricted ; and a resinous juice exudes from the trunk 
of the tree, similar to what is seen in Hedera terebinthacea. 
The examination of specimens which had been subjected to drying 
appears to have misled Mr. Miers as to the real structure of the ovary 
and seed. I have been unable to discover any trace of the incomplete 
dissepiment mentioned by that acute observer; and the inversion of 
the putamen, by which the albumen is longitudinally deeply divided 
into two lobes, is not due, as is suspected by Mr. Miers, to the thick- 
ening of the placenta, for the groove or furrow caused by the inflexion 
of the putamen is on the back of the seed, the part most distant from 
the placenta. In the ovule a longitudinal depression is observable, 
which becomes deeper during the subsequent development, until in the 
ripe seed it has assumed the appearance mentioned above. In a trans- 
verse section of a very young seed, the ends of the vessels of the raphe 
may be very distinctly seen on the side opposite to that in which the 
depression occurs. I find the embryo with its narrow cotyledons very 
nearly equalling the albumen in length. 
Note on the Development and Structure of the Integuments of the Seed of 
MAGNOLIA; dy Dr. Asa Gray, Professor of Botany, Cambridge 
University, Boston, U.S. 
By the phrase “semina baccata,” Linnszus, and after him De Can- — 
dolle and others, may be supposed to imply that the fleshy external - 
investment of the seed of Magnolia is a proper seed-coat. Jussieu - 
(Gen. Pl. p. 281) first suggested a different view, in his expression, - 
* semina ossea, baceata seu arillata;" and Blume (Fl. Javze) explicitly — 
terms the pulpy covering an arillus: an idea which was adopted by 
Lindley and by Zuccarini (Pl. Nov. Hort. et Herb. Monac., fasc. 2), 
