188 B BOTANICAL INFORMATION. 
We shall endeavour to prove it by the following calculation. The male 
cone, of which I have given the description elsewhere, is (in metres) 0°450 
long, and 0-200 broad. The sum of the external surface is difficult to 
estimate on account of the irregular form of the organ, but it cannot be 
considerable. In calculating the number of scales at 3500, and the surface 
of each of them at four square centimetres, the whole sum of the organs 
which compose the cone should be equal to 14,000 square centimetres. 
The surface of the scales at the underside is covered with unilocular an- 
thers almost contiguous, and the number of these anthers may be calcu” 
lated at 400. "Thus the total number of these anthers might be calculated 
at 1,400,000. Each anther contains several thousands of granules of 
pollen, which in a very short space of time undergo, in their cavities, 
all the necessary organie, physical, and chemical changes. It is easy 
to admit that the alternate absorption and emission of gas, in so rapid 
a process, must have an important part. The whole leads us to be- 
lieve that, in which there is so great an analogy in the functions (as in 
the flowers of Aroideous and Cycadeous plants), the same agents 
should regulate and preside over the phenomena of life, of which, 
all that modern science has been able to discover as to its mode of 
action, belongs to physics and chemistry. 
Sale of the extensive HERBARIUM and of the Books of the late GEORGE 
GARDNER, Ese., F.R.S., Director of the Royal Botanic Garden, Pera- 
denia, Ceylon. 
In consequence of the lamented death of Mr. Gardner, instructions 
have been given to the executors to sell, without reserve, the entire 
of the above-mentioned collections of this gentleman, which have 
recently been received in London for that purpose. The whole 
Gardnerian Herbarium, that is, the collection arranged by himself for 
his own use, it is wished should be disposed of separately and by private 
contract. It is admirably arranged, and as fully and correctly named 
_ as probably any of like extent; all the specimens are fastened upon the 
best stout white demy folio paper, measuring sixteen inches long, by 
ten and a half inches broad. Every genus is included in one or more 
envelopes of the same paper in folded sheets, and marked on the outside 
with the name of the genus, that of the natural family, and numbered 
