CHAPTER: 228 
THE CONE-BEARING PLANTS 
FLOWERING plants are obviously too large a group to 
study without any attempt to split them up into sections, 
and Nature has cut off one important group by a very 
clear distinction, to which I made reference in Chapter I. 
The Pines, Larches, and Firs, with their close allies, the 
Juniper and the Yew, although they have flowers, have 
not developed the seed-vessel. Their seeds are placed 
naked or exposed at the base of the pistil, and so they 
get their name of Gymnosperm (“undressed”), a word 
allied to our “gymnastics,” from the costume, or the lack 
of it, in which the Greeks raced and wrestled. 
You will recall how the pollen-grain, falling on the 
stigma, thrust out its tube, and bored its way down the 
style, until it came to the ovary, and then made its way 
to the micropyle, or tiny gate, which was left at the mouth 
of the embryo seed. The process is very much simpler 
with this group, for the “ micropyle” is exposed direct to 
the air, and the pollen-grain falls direct upon it, and its 
tube starts on a much shorter journey. From the illustra- 
tion, you will get a clear idea of the method, and you will 
be reminded of the family we have just left, the ferns. 
There we saw a prothalliwm, in which there were flask- 
shaped bodies, the archegona, and you remember how, at 
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