342 THE GARDENER. [AUG. 



proved pre-eminent. The transition from the belief of tins pre-emin- 

 ence in the past to a ready belief of it in the present, was a natural, 

 easy, and graceful process. But the emphatic thoroughness of the 

 verdict makes one even more suspicious of its veracity and sceptical 

 as to its value. The Archimedean Mower was designated as " perfectly 

 useless, either for long or short grass." To quarrel even with such a 

 verdict as this, much less to attempt to refute that which carries its 

 own refutation with it, were a mere waste of time. As sympathisers 

 with the old British love for fair-play, we have referred to this trial ; 

 and we join our protest with those of some who were present, against 

 such a burlesque on justice as this appears to have been. 



The Sexual Conditions of Plants is a theme which has been engag- 

 ing the attention of botanists for some time past. In the ' Journal of 

 Botany' Mr Worthington Smith recently contributed some interesting 

 observations of a curious character. Across the Atlantic the American 

 botanists appear to be pursuing the same line of study, with equally 

 interesting and valuable results. In a recent number of the 'Pro- 

 ceedings of the Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia,' Mr 

 Meehan continues to detail some suggestive researches, and gives the 

 following observations on the cross fertilisation and the law of sex in 

 Euphorbia. Mr. Meehan states : — 



"The list of plants which seem to avoid self-fertilisation is already very lai^ge. 

 I think Euphorbia may be added to the number. Certainly this is the case with 

 Euphorbia fulgens, Karw. (E. jacquinireflora, Hook.), which I have watched very 

 closely in my greenhouse this winter. Several days before the stamens burst 

 through the involucre which closely invests them, the pistil with its ovarium on 

 the long pedicle has protruded itself beyond, exposed its stigmatic surface, and 

 received the pollen from the neighbouring flowers. The way in which the pollen 

 scatters itself is curious. In most flowers a slight jar or a breath of wind will 

 waft the pollen to the stigmas, but I have not been able to notice any to leave 

 the flowers in this way ; for as soon as the anther cells burst, the whole stamen 

 falls from its filament-like pedicle, and either drops at once on the pistils of 

 other flowers, or scatters its pollen grains by the force of the fall. 



"This Euphorbia also furnishes another contribution to the theory of sex 

 which I have advanced. The plan on which the male and female organs are 

 formed is evidently a common one ; and the only reason why some flower-heads 

 have a pistil in the centre, and others are wholly staminate, is, that there is 

 greater axial vigour when the female flower is formed. "Whenever the common 

 peduncle (below the scarlet involucre) is weak, a pistil never appears in that 

 head of flowers. A few which seem strong never have them, but the great 

 majority of the strong pecundles are those which bear the female blossoms. 

 Another interesting fact is, that the number of male flowers is less in those heads 

 which also bear a female than in those which are wholly staminate. This seems 

 to add to the point I made in my paper on Ambrosia, that after the flowers have 

 been partially formed in embryo, and before the sex has been finally determined, 

 the female flower, being primordially the stronger, has the power of absorbing the 

 males of their partially-formed elements into its system. It is certainly remark- 



