140 Transactions of the Society. 



be ignored. It is not my intention to push further the comparison 

 of the Bennettitean fructifications with the angiospermous flower ; 

 the deeply interesting questions which must suggest themselves to 

 the mind of every botanist, as to how far these manifest analogies 

 are likely to indicate an immediate affinity, will be fully discussed 

 elsewhere by others. Enough has been said to sliow that the re- 

 markable organs discovered by Dr. Wieland fully merit the name 

 of " flower," in the same sense in which we apply it, in everyday 

 language, to the flowers of our gardens and fields. I am inclined 

 myself to believe that the comparison holds good from a morpho- 

 logical point of view also, but it may be fair to mention that some 

 botanists have regarded each seed-bearing pedicel, with the adjacent 

 interseminal scales, as itself constituting a flower, in which case 

 the whole would, of course, be an inflorescence, comparable to the 

 capitulum of the Composite. This interpretation, however, can 

 scarcely be extended to the stamens, which are, to all appearance, 

 seated directly on the receptacle. On the whole, I agree with 

 Dr. Wieland that the simpler view of the whole fructification as a 

 single axis, bearing fertile and sterile organs of a foliar nature, 

 better corresponds to the facts and to the analogies with related 

 groups. The homologies of the seed-pedicels and interseminal scales 

 and especially their relations to the carpellary structures in Angio- 

 sperms, in any ease present a difficult and fascinating problem to 

 the morphologist. 



As stress has been laid so far on the points of agreement with 

 the flower of the Angiosperms, some reference must now be made 

 to characters which indicate relations in other directions. The 

 structure of the gyn?ecium renders it probable, if not certain, that 

 the Bennettite?e were still Gymuosperms as regards their mode of 

 pollination, for the openings between the scales of the pericarp 

 leave the micropyles of the seeds exposed (see pi. VII. fig. 2, A). 

 One must tlierefore suppose that the pollen was received by the 

 ovule directly, without the intervention of a stigma, so that 

 functional Angiospermy had not yet been attained. This is, no 

 doubt, a primitive condition, but it by no means excludes an affinity 

 with Angiosperms. Just as in Lagenostoma, the seed of the Pterido- 

 sperm Lyginodendron, the beak of the nucellus was still the recep- 

 tive organ for the pollen, in spite of the presence of an integument,* 

 so, in the Bennettitean flower, the micropyle of the seed was still 

 the receptive organ in spite of the presence of a pericarp. The 

 integument in the one case and the pericarp in the other might be 

 termed a " prophetic organ " in the only sense in which such organs 

 exist, i.e. an organ which has not yet assumed all the functions to 

 which it is destined. 



The stamens, while by their arrangement and position they 



* See Oliver and Scott, " On the Structure of the Palaeozoic Seed Lageno- 

 stoma Lomaxi," Phil. Trans. Roy. Soc, Series B., 197 (1904), p. 231. 



