82 



now PLANTS ARE PUOrAGATED. 



223 



Mulberry. 



248, Multiple Fruits are masses of simple or accessory fruits belonging to differ- 

 ent flowers, all compacted together. Mulberries (Fig. 223) are of this sort. They 



look like blackberries, but each grain belongs to a separate 

 flower ; and the eatable pulp is not even the seed-vessel of that, 

 but is a loose calyx grown pulpy, just like that of Checker- 

 berry, and surrounding an akene, which is generally taken for a 

 seed. The pine-apple is much like a mulberry on a large scale. 

 A fig is a multiple fruit, being a hollow flower-stalk grown pulpy, 

 the inside lined by a great number of minute flowers. 



249. So, under the name of fruit very different things are 

 eaten. In figs it is a hollow flower-stalk ; in pine-apples and 

 mulberries, clusters of flower-leaves, as 

 well as the stalk they cover ; in straw- 

 berries, the receptacle of a flower; in blackberries, the 



same, though smaller, and a cluster of little stone-fruits 



that cover it; in raspberries, the little stone-fruits in a 



cluster, without the receptacle. In checkerberries, quinces, 



and (as to all but the core) apples and pears, we eat a 



fleshy enlarged calyx ; in peaches and other stone-fruits, 



the outer part of a seed-vessel ; in grapes, gooseberries, 



blueberries, and cranberries, the whole 

 seed-vessel, grown rich and pulpy. 



250. TllC Cone of Pine (Fig. 224) and 

 the like is a sort of multiple fruit. Each 

 scale is a whole pistillate flower, con- 

 sisting of an open pistil leaf, ripened, and 



bearing on its upper face one or two naked seeds, — as explained at the end of the last 

 section (218, 219). Fig. 225 shows the upper side of one of the thick scales taken 

 off, bearing one seed ; the other, removed, is shown, with its wing, in Fig. 226. 



§ 2. Seeds. 



252. A Seed is an ovule fertilized and matured, and with a germ or embryo 

 formed in it. 



- 253. In the account of the growth of plants from the seed, at the beginning of 

 the book (Chapter I. Section I.), seeds have already been considered sufficiently 



225 



£25 



Pitch-pine Cone. 



