THE HYACINTH. 



1839 



over the sides of the flower ; in the pansy it is a hollow globe, with 

 a small aperture on one side ; in the grasses it is a tufted hairy body 

 something like a brush ; in the orchis it is a hollow basin placed at 

 the summit of the column and besmeared over with a gluey substance 

 in order to cause adherence of the pollen when cast from the anther. 

 It is, therefore, an established fact that for the purpose of vegetable 

 reproduction there must of necessity be, as in animals, a conjunction 

 of the sexes. This was discovered at a very early period in the cul- 

 tivation of the date palm and the fig, when it was found that those 

 flowers of the date in which the beginning of a fruit was discoverable, 

 would never arrive at maturity unless sprinkled with the powder 

 secreted in the flowers of other individuals of the same species of 

 palm, and hence they considered the latter to be males and the 

 former females, which was true. Wild figs again were found to be 

 necessary, by coming in contact with it, to enable the fruit of the 

 cultivated fig to mature ; and hence they also supposed the former 

 to be males and the latter females, which, however, was not true. 

 Caprification, as the hanging of wild over the cultivated figs is 

 tenned, does not depend upon the powder of the wild fig coming in 

 contact with the fruit of the cultivated fig, but upon a totally diflferent 

 circumstance, for both figs are in reality perfect in themselves. 

 What makes the act of caprification necessary is this, — that the 

 flowers of a fig are inclosed in a fleshy case, which finally becomes 

 the fruit; and, from some unknown cause, does not readily ripen 

 unless injured by the puncture of an insect. Now the wild fig 

 abounds with a little fly called a cynips, and consequently when it is 

 brought into the vicinity of the cultivated fig, the latter is attacked 

 by the cynips and thus enabled to mature. 



That my assertion is true, viz. that there must be a conjunction 

 of the sexes, will be proved by a very simple experiment. Take an 

 apple-blossom, and cut out the anthers before they burst, and no 

 apple will be formed; or in the cucumber plant, in which some of 

 the flowers bear stamens, only, and others only pistils; if the 

 stamens are cut away, the pistils instead of swelling out immediately 

 after the flower has faded will turn yellow, wither and drop oflT; 

 so that we are surrounded with proofs of the necessity of the 

 anthers to fertilize the pistils. When the two are on one flower it is 

 easy to conceive how the pollen is conveyed to the stigma ; and it is 



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