HEEBERT SPENCEr's BIOLOGY. 377 



and, in replying to the question he expresses his conviction that the 

 distinction between the two organs is not absolute. In this we 

 heartily concur ; but we regret that the arguments here brought 

 forward in support of this opinion are based upon false premises. 

 For instance, Mr. Spencer speaks of a sepal being transformed into 

 a flower-bud, forgetting the morphological axiom that an organ once 

 formed, never becomes transformed into anything else. 



The greatest stress is laid upon the appearances presented by 

 certain monstrous umbellifers. The descriptions of these given by our 

 author are so much at variance with the teaching and dicta of Botan- 

 ists generally, that it is to be regretted that they are not accompanied 

 by larger and clearer illustrations, iq the absence of which no morpho- 

 logist, we are confident, will accept Mr. Spencer's interpretations. 

 So far as we can judge, we should suppose the malformations in 

 question to have been cases of prolification, either of the inflorescence 

 or of the flower. That is, either the peduncles or rays of the urabel 

 have been subdivided, so as to increase the compound nature of the 

 umbel, or there has been an adventitious formation of flower buds 

 in the axils of the sepals, or of the petals, &c. — axillary prolification 

 in short. These changes have been accompanied by others of more 

 or less importance. Findiag an umbellule where, under ordinary 

 circumstances, a single flower is produced, our author's inference is 

 that the flower is transformed into an umbellule. Now, if this 

 were so, then the simple umbel itself would be the result of a trans- 

 formed flower, and not due to the formation of a second generation 

 of flower-stalks. If Mr. Spencer's views be correct, in what light 

 would he view the bracts of the involucre, or of the involucel? 

 "Would they be portions of the flower that is transformed into an 

 umbellule ? If so, they should at times, at least, show transitional 

 stages between their ordinary condition and that of floral organs. 

 Proceeding with his descriptions, Mr. Spencer mentions " a 

 peripheral flower, of which one member (apparently a petal, is trans- 

 formed into a flower bud)." How this could happen we are at a loss 

 to know. Leaf-buds are formed upon leaves under certain circum- 

 stances, but there is no instance, that we know of, of a flower-bud 

 actually arising from a leaf — though sometimes, as ia ErytJirochiton, 

 the adhesion of the flower stalk to the leaf gives rise to such an appear- 

 ance, but in neither of the cases just cited would any one say that the 

 leaf or flower-bud had arisen from a transformation of the leaf. 

 Other flowers are described as half-flower, half-umbellule ; these, then, 



