CHAPTER XIIL* 



FUNCTIONS OF THE STAMENS AND PISTILS, 



" The Stamens and Pistils of flowers have, from the 

 most remote antiquity, been considered as of great im- 

 portance in perfecting the fruit. The Date Palm, from 

 time immemorial a primary object of cultivation in the 

 more temperate climates of the globe, bears barren and 

 fertile flowers on separate trees. The ancient Greeks 

 soon discovered that in order to have abundant and well- 

 flavoured fruit, it was expedient to plant both trees 

 near together, or to bring the barren blossoms to those 

 which were to bear fruit ; and in this chiefly consisted 

 the culture of that valuable plant. Tournefort tells us 

 that without such assistance dates have no kernel, and 

 are not good food. The same has long been practised, 

 and is continued to this very day in the Levant, upon 

 the Pistacia and the Fig. 



About the year 1676, Sir Thomas Millington, Savil- 

 ian Professor at Oxford, is recorded to have hinted to 

 Dr. Grew that the use of the Stamens was probably to 

 perfect and fertilize the seed. Grew adopted the idea, 

 and the great Ray approved it. Pontedera, however, at 

 Padua, ac university long famous, but then on the de- 

 cline, and conseq lently adverse to all new inquiry and 

 information, in 1720 published his Anthologia, quite on 

 the other side of the question. 



Linnaeus, towards the year 1732, reviewed all that 

 had been done before him, and clearly established the 



* This chapter with a few alterations is taken from_the 

 " Introduction" of Dr. Smith. 



