134 WEATHERWAX: MORPHOLOGY OF FLOWERS OF ZEA Mays 
short protuberance at the top of the ovary, to one side of which 
the stigma is attached (Fics. 3 and 4 and Text FIG. 3). The 
style is traversed by a tubular opening leading from the surface 
to the interior of the ovary (Fics. 3 and 4 and Text FIG. 3.) This 
canal is especially prominent in young stages of ovarian develop- 
ment and never quite disappears. It has been termed the stylar 
canal by practically all that have had occasion to mention it, 
even by some of those that call the silk a style. Whether or not 
the pollen tube traverses this canal on its way to the ovule has 
not been determined. 
The ovary is thick-walled and contains a single large, ana- 
tropous ovule. The embryo-sac is near the upper side, with refer- 
ence to the cob as an axis, and the embryo is developed on that 
side of the caryopsis. The detailed structure and development of 
the ovary properly belongs in another connection and has bees 
worked out by True (9, p. 212), Poindexter (11, p. 3), Guig- 
nard (10, p. 2), and others. | 
Just below the ovary, and somewhat irregularly spaced around 
the circumference of its support, are three small, rudimentary 
stamens (Fic. 4 and Text Fic. 3). They have a yellowish, 
wrinkled appearance and stain like disorganizing tissue. Baillon — 
(4, P. 325) makes mention of “stamina 3 (in flore foemineo ad 
staminodia vix conspicua reducta,”’ but Bentham and Hooker 
(5, p. 1114) dismiss the question with “staminodia o.” The 
other works that I have examined make no mention of these 
rudimentary stamens. . 
In the normally functional flower of the female spikelet the 
lodicules are, in so far as I have observed, entirely lacking. Mont 
gomery (2, p. 61) has noted the same fact. 
The aborted flower is much more simple in structure than the — 
functional one just described. It is located between the lowe 
lemma and palea, and, because of the suppressed development of 
its basal parts, it appears to be on the side of the pedicel that 
supports the functional flower (Fic. 4). In other words, the 
functional flower appears to terminate the rachilla, while the 
aborted one seems to be laterally attached; but there is no re@ — 
evidence that either flower is morphologically at the end Gs 
the rachilla. 
