distal end of the fruit, within which are a few wrinkled and 

 compacted flakes of epidermis. Such is the character of the 

 fruits seen in the markets, hut among those which are rejected 

 by the packers are many in which this adventitious growth is 

 greatly developed. In these examples the navel opening is 

 enlarged and filled with rough, corrugated rind, which usually 

 protrudes irregularly, sometimes taking the form of finger-like 

 projections, which mav be four or five inches long; and some- 

 times of an irregidar globose body. When this last form is of 

 good size it presents the appearance of an abortive orange fused 

 to the end of the primary one. 



The nature of this excrescence is obscure. It has been ex- 

 plained as being in reality the fusion of two distinct fruits, an 

 explanation suggested by the appearance of the extreme globu- 

 lose- protrusions wdiich often occur. Prolification cannot, how- 

 ever, be assumed in the case of the navel orange, since this 

 would necessarily be preceded by a modification of the flower, 

 whereas the flower of the Navel is regular in all its cycles. 

 Osawa attributes the production of the "navel" to the multipli- 

 cation of loculi and carpels, which eventually protrude from the 

 end of the fruit. He compares it to a somewhat similar growth 

 in some varieties of tomato, and considers both as results of high 

 cultivation. "Splitting" of the orange, that is the opening of a 

 crevice across the end of the fruit, a defect to which the Navel is 

 subject at the time of ripening, is also attributed to the addi- 

 tional carpels, which, as they swell in ripening, exert a pressure 

 too great for the strength of the epidermis, and rupture it. 

 These explanations are not entirelv satisfactory, but are the best 

 that have vet been ofl:ered. 



4S 



