18621871] JOHN SCOTT 303 



for. I am furthermore induced to communicate the results of Letter 631 

 my yet imperfect experiments in the belief that the actuating 

 principle of your late work is the elicitation of truth, and that 

 you will gladly avail yourself of this even at the sacrifice of 

 much ingenious theoretical argumentation. 



Since I have had an opportunity of perusing your work 

 on orchid fertilisation, my attention has been particularly 

 directed to the curiously constructed floral organs of 

 Acropera. I unfortunately have as yet had only a few 

 flowers for experimental enquiry, otherwise my remarks 

 might have been clearer and more satisfactory. Such as they 

 are, however, I respectfully lay [them] before you, with a full 

 assurance of their veracity, and I sincerely trust that as such 

 you will receive them. 



Your observations seem to have been chiefly directed to 

 the A. luteola, mine to the A. Loddigesii, which, however, as 

 you remark, is in a very similar constructural condition with 

 the former ; having the same narrow stigmatic chamber, 

 abnormally developed placenta, etc. In regard to the former 

 point contraction of stigmatic chamber I may remark that 

 it does not appear to be absolutely necessary that the pollen- 

 masses penetrate this chamber for effecting fecundation. 

 Thus a raceme was produced upon a plant of A. Loddigesii 

 in the Botanic Gardens here lately ; upon this I left only six 

 flowers. These I attempted to fertilise, but with two only of 

 the six have I been successful : I succeeded in forcing a single 

 pollen-mass into the stigmatic chamber of one of the latter, 

 but I failed to do this on the other ; however, by inserting 

 a portion of a pedicel with a pollinium attached, I caused the 

 latter to adhere, with a gentle press, to the mouth of the 

 stigmatic chamber. Both of these, as I have already re- 

 marked, are nevertheless fertilised ; one of them I have cut 

 off for examination, and its condition I will presently 

 describe ; the other is still upon the plant, and promises 

 fair to attain maturity. In regard to the other four flowers, 

 I may remark that though similarly fertilised part having 

 pollinia inserted, others merely attached they all withered 

 and dropped off without the least swelling of the ovary. Can 

 it be, then, that this is really an [andro-moncecious] species ?- 

 part of the flowers male, others truly hermaphrodite. 



In making longitudinal sections of the fertilised ovary 



