596 Sir John Lubbock [Feb. 18, 



pardon me if, for a few moments, I go into very elementary facts. In 

 order to understand the structure of the seed, we must commence 

 with the flower, to which the seed owes its origin. Now if you take 

 such a flower as, say, a Geranium, you will find that it consists of the 

 following parts : Firstly, there is a whorl of green leaves, known as 

 the sepals, and together forming the calyx; secondly, a whorl of 

 colored leaves, or petals, generally forming the most conspicuous 

 part of the flower, and called the corolla ; thirdly, a whorl of organs 

 more or less like pins, which are called stamens ; and in the heads, or 

 anthers, of which the pollen is produced. These anthers are in 

 reality, as Goethe showed, modified leaves ; in the so-called double 

 flowers, as, for instance, in our garden roses, they are developed into 

 colored leaves like those of the corolla, and monstrous flowers are 

 not unfrequently met with, in which the stamens are green leaves, 

 more or less resembling the ordinary leaves of the plant. Lastly, in 

 the centre of the flower is the pistil, which also is theoretically to be 

 considered as constituted of one or more leaves, each of which is 

 folded on itself, and called a carpel. Sometimes there is only one 

 carpel. Generally the carpels have so completely lost the appear- 

 ance of leaves, that this explanation of their true nature requires a 

 certain amount of faith. The base of the pistil is the ovary, com- 

 posed, as I have just mentioned, of one or more carpels, in which 

 the seeds are developed. I need hardly say that many so-called 

 seeds are really fruit ; that is to say, they are seeds with more or less 

 complex envelopes. 



We all know that seeds and fruits differ greatly in different 

 species. Some are large, some small; some are sweet, some bitter; 

 some are brightly colored, some are good to eat, some poisonous, 

 some spherical, some winged, some covered with bristles, some with 

 hairs, some are smooth, some very sticky ; and we may be sure that 

 there are good reasons for these differences. 



In the case of flowers, much light has been thrown on their various 

 interesting peculiarities by the researches of Sprengel, Darwin, 

 Miiller, and other naturalists. As regards seeds also, besides 

 Gaertner's great work, Hildebrand, Krause, Steinbrinck, Kerner, 

 Grant Allen, Wallace, Darwin, and others, have published valuable 

 researches, especially with reference to the hairs and hooks with 

 which so many seeds are provided, and the other means of dispersion 

 they possess. Nobbe also has contributed an important work on 

 seeds, principally from an agricultural point of view, but the subject 

 as a whole offers a most promising field for investigation. It is 

 rather with a view of suggesting this branch of science to you, than 

 of attempting to supply the want myself, that I now propose to call 

 your attention to it. In doing so I must, in the first place, express 

 my acknowledgments to Mr. Baker, Mr. Carruthers, Mr. Hemsley, 

 and specially to Mr. Thiselton Dyer and Sir Joseph Hooker, for 

 their kind and most valuable assistance. 



It is said that one of our best botanists once observed to another 



