19 



the grainineae, and if the cells be regarded as of prothaUial 

 nature, support is given to the modern view that the grasses 

 should be considered primary rather than reduced forms, 

 the higher angiosperms having normally only three 

 antipodals. 



POLLINATION. 



Although the gramineas have higlily specialised organs 

 (Fig. i) well suited to wind-pollination, and it has been 

 generally held that wind-borne pollen is the fertilising 

 medium, there have ever been those who ha\e contended 

 that cereal grasses, as wheat and barle)-, are pollinated 

 with pollen from their own flower, i.e., they are self- 

 pollinated, and, as a consequence, also self-fertiUsed. Some 

 of these investigators have not sufficiently discriminated 

 between these two distinct phenomena, and rendered much 

 of their work vain. 



In the "Gardeners' Chronicle" of 14th and 21st 

 March, 1874, A. S. Wilson gives a series of interesting 

 field and other experiments to show that the flowers of 

 wheat and barley in particular rarely fully open, some not 

 at all. and usually only a stamen or two with an occasional 

 stigma protrude He found that barley plants removed 

 before their flowers were open or pollinated, afterwards 

 set seed as freely in the still air of a room as those in the 

 field ; a difference of about 2 per cent, being probably due 

 to neglect in watering the plants. Rye flowers open much 

 more full)-, and by him considered to be less adapted to 

 self-pollination, under similar conditions yielded 20 per 

 cent, of seed, against 78 per cent, given b)- those in the 

 field. 



Others, as Cartons of Warrington. 1880 forward, have 

 remarked on the absence of new varieties occurring 



