130 



STRUCTURAL BOTANY. 



[111. 



same element ? Look again. Here is a double flower, 

 a Poppy of the gardens, artificially developed ; its 

 slender white stamens have indeed expanded into 

 broad red petals ! 



333. The argument begins with the sepals. In the 

 Rose and Paeony, and in most flowers, the sepals have 

 all the characteristics of leaves color, form, venation, 

 etc. The transition from leaves to bracts and from 

 bracts to sepals is so gradual as to place their identity 



406 



404 



404, Papaver (poppy) s, stamens; p, stigmas. 405, sepaL 406,'Petal all very different. 407 to 414, 

 Petals of the Water-lily (Nymphaea) gradually passing into stamens. 



beyond doubt. Again, in Calicanthus, the sepals pass 

 by insensible gradations into petals; and in the Lilies 

 these two organs are almost identical. Hence, if the 

 sepals are leaves, the petals are leaves also. In respect 

 to the nature of the stamens, the Water-lily is partic- 

 ularly instructive. Here we see a perfect gradation 

 of forms from stamens to petals, and thence to sepals, 

 where, half-way between the two former, we find a 

 narrow petal tipped with the semblance of an anther 

 (410). Finally, cases of close resemblance between 

 stamen and pistil, so unlike in the Poppy, are not 

 wanting. For example, the Tulip-tree. 



334. Teratology. Cases in ABTIFIOIAL DEVELOPMENT where organs of one 

 kind are converted into those of another kind by cultivation, afford undeni- 

 able evidence of the doctrine in question the homology of all the floral organs 

 with each other and with the leaf. Such cases are frequent in the garden, and, 



