PAPILONACEOTJS FLOWERS. lo 



These cotyledones or seed-leaves are generally two 

 in number, and indicative of that double system which 

 so generally prevails throughout organic nature. In 

 such plants as the Lilac, Ash, Privet, and many others, 

 this double system, commenced in the seed, is perpe- 

 tually continued, the leaves coining out in constant 

 pairs ; but in many others, as in the Oak, Elm, Ches- 

 nut, Beach, and Alder, no opposite, or paired leaves 

 come out after the opposite seed-leaves, so that they 

 appear subject, as in very many other cases, to a per- 

 petual abortion of one half of their supposed exist- 

 ence. 



In the liliaceous plants and grasses, however, and 

 some other tribes, there appears lo exist no proper 

 leaf-like cotyledones, and the uncleft, unchanged sub- 

 stance of the seed, serves to nourish the growing em- 

 bryon. 



Among the anomalies which nature ever presents to 

 baffle our feeble systems, and to assert her predilec- 

 tion for endless variety, we may observe, that though 

 we can, in general, circumscribe and define with suf- 

 ficient precision the character of the very natural family 

 of the papilionaceee, yet there exist among them some 

 notable exceptions ; thus, in Amorpha, there exists 

 but a single petal occuping the place of the vexillum ; 

 and the ten stamens, all united into an uncloven cyl- 

 inder. Nay more, in the Petalostemon of Michaux, a 

 plant of the western regions of the United States, re- 

 sembling Saint-foin, there are no proper petals in their 

 true place, but five of the filaments of the stamens, in 

 place of anthers, developing as many petals, so that 

 the tube presents alternately five anthers and five pe- 

 tals. In the Wild Indigo (Podalyria tinctoria), 

 with a truly papilionaceous corolla, there are ten dis- 

 tinct stamens, as there are also in the Judas-tree ov 

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