L ly* 3 



CHAPTER XIX. 



OF THE FLOWER AND FRUIT. 



Haviiii^ examined the general structure and external 

 form of plants, we now come to more important and 

 even essential, though more transitory organs — the flow- 

 er and fruit, or parts of fructification. By these each spe- 

 cies is perpetually renewed without limits, so far at least 

 as the observation of mankind has reached ; while, as 

 we have already mentioned, all other modes of propaga- 

 tion are but the extension of an individual, and sooner or 

 later terminate in its total extinction. 



Nothing can be more happy than the Linnaean defini- 

 tion of these organs ; Ph'iL Bot.52. " The fructifica- 

 tion is a temporary part of vegetables, destined for the 

 reproduction of the species, terminating the old individ- 

 ual and beginning the new." 



Pliny had long ago beautifully said, that " blossoms 

 are the joy of trees, in bearing which they assume a new 

 aspect, vicing with each other in the luxuriance and va- 

 riety of their colours." Linnaeus has justly applied this 

 to plants in general, and, improving upon the idea, he 

 considers their herbage as only a mask or clothing, by no 

 means indicative of their true nature or chiracter, which 

 can be learned from the flower and fruit alone. 



Mr. Knight has traced his central vessels, by which 

 the sap is conveyed from the root, in the flower and 

 fruit. On the returning sap into the bark of these parts 

 he has not been able to make any distinct observation ; 



