THE FLOWER 



43 



Fig. 30. Flower and fruit of 

 gooseberry. A. flower : B. half- 

 ripe fruit ; a. calyx-tube : b. 

 ovary. (Cut from Crjc. of Hardy 

 Fruits, p. 295.) 



arises from a terminal bud. The apple and some plums furnish 

 examples of fruit flowers in which the inflorescence is a cyme. 

 In the apple, the central flower unfolds first, which is the reverse 

 of the corymb of a pear. 



Differences in kind of inflorescence distinguish genera and 

 species, but in the varieties characters must be looked for in the 

 inflorescence itself. Thus, the 

 pedicel, which becomes the stem 

 of the fruit, varies greatly in va- 

 rieties of all hardy fruits. There 

 are many flowers in the inflor- 

 escence of some varieties of a 

 species ; in others, few. In some, 

 the flowers are loosely arranged ; 

 in others, compactly. In the 

 bramble-fruits, the inflores- 

 cences vary greatly in the char- 

 acters named; and the clusters 

 may be long or short, dense or 

 open; peduncles entire or di- 

 vided; few- or many-flowered; with or without spines, pubes- 

 cence, bracts, or glands; peduncle erect, spreading, or droop- 

 ing, and so on, making the inflorescence an invaluable means of 

 distinguishing brambles. 



In the strawberry the inflorescence not only offers valuable 

 means of identification, but on its characters commercial im- 

 portance depends somewhat. Thus, it is desirable that a variety 

 have stout erect fruit-stalks w^hich will hold the berries off the 

 ground and that are not easily broken by the pickers. On the 

 other hand, it is not desirable that the flower-stalk rise above 

 the foliage where frost, rains, and the sun would find flower and 

 fruit unprotected. 



68. The receptacle. — The expanded end of the peduncle, the 

 receptacle as it has been defined, offers very marked means of 

 distinguishing plants, and greatly modifies the value of the 

 fruit in one way and another. The flowers of several fruits 

 have many pistils, to accommodate which the receptacle is en- 

 larged, as in the blackberry, other brambles, and the strawberry. 

 In the blackberry the receptacle comes away with tbe ripe fruits 



