TRANSACTIONS OF THE SECTIONS. 433 



certainly predict will be good, notwithstanding they may not 

 be the best that might be produced ; and the ships which would 

 be included in the experiments proposed would have all the 

 essential qualities of a man-of-war, except, that by differing in 

 form, some would be superior to others in respect of velocity. 

 Naval architecture is a branch of science which depends so 

 essentially upon experiment for its advancement, and the ex- 

 periments are necessarily upon so large and expensive a scale, 

 as to place it out of the power of individuals, or even of socie- 

 ties of individuals, to conduct them. It is, therefore, one of 

 those enterprises in science which none but a nation can un- 

 dertake ; and it is worthy of so great a maritime nation as En- 

 gland to endeavour to advance, at whatever reasonable cost, a 

 subject so important to its defence. 



III. NATURAL HISTORY— ANATOMY- 

 PHYSIOLOGY. 



On the originary Structure of the Floiver, and the mutual De- 

 pendency of its Parts. By Professor Agardh. 



The observations in this paper were generally directed against 

 the commonly adopted view, that the flower is formed of several 

 verticils independent of each other. The author remarked the 

 difference between the appearance of the verticillated parts and 

 their real and originary situations. Adopting the view, that 

 the flower is nothing more than a branch, which has been re- 

 duced to a mere point whilst its subordinate parts have been 

 transformed, he concluded that the different parts of each ver- 

 ticillus formed an originary spiral, and are really of unequal 

 order, age, and situation, which, in many cases, is still evident 

 during the inflorescence ; and imagining the branch shortened 

 to a point, it will be found that the upper, later, and weaker 

 parts must be the inner ones of the apparent verticillus. 



The second point of Professor Agardh's view is, that the 

 stamens are not transformations of petals but of buds. This 

 view is consistent with the whole theory of the development of 

 plants, as laid down in a separate work {Organography of Plants), 

 and founded on the principle, that the several appendicular 

 parts of the plant are not all transformed leaves, but only one 

 part of them are transformed leaves, and others are transformed 

 buds, so that to every part which is a transformed leaf be- 



1833. 2 F 



