166 



HUTCHINSON'S POPULAR BOTANY 



slender root-hairs are given off; and along with these, the antheridia and 

 archegonia minute organs of reproduction, homologous with, though 

 simpler in structure than, those of Mosses. It is only when fertilization has 

 taken place that the egg develops into a new Fern-plant. 



Thus far we have confined ourselves to spores, which are the chief means 

 of multiplication in the lower plants, and which, as already pointed out, 

 contain no young plant or embryo. Spore-plants have no evident flowers, 



and their organs of fructification were 

 obscure to the early botanists, on which 

 account they were' called Cryptogams, 

 or Hidden-marriage plants, from the 

 Greek kruptos, hidden, and gamos, mar- 

 riage. They form, indeed, one of the 

 two great sub-kingdoms into which all 

 plants are divided ; the other sub-king- 

 dom comprising the Seed-plants or 

 Phanerogams (Greek phaneros, evident, 

 and gamos). To the Spore-plants or 

 Cryptogams belong the Protophytes 

 (unicellular forms of vegetable life, 

 whether containing chlorophyll or not), 

 Algoa, or Seaweeds, Fungi, Liverworts, 

 Mosses, Ferns, Horsetails, Club-mosses, 

 Water-ferns, and Selaginellas ; and to 

 these we shall revert at greater length 

 in later chapters ; the Seed-plants or 

 Phanerogams embrace all the rest. 



Bearing in mind what has been said 

 about spores, let us now observe the 

 process of germination in true seeds. 

 On planting a grain of "Wheat or 

 Barley in suitable soil, the first change 

 to be noticed is the swelling of the 

 grain, and this is followed before very 

 long by the appearance of a root- 

 the primary root and several indepen- 

 dent root-fibres (fig. 210), the former 

 dying before it has grown to any 

 length. The stem, which originates in 

 what it known as the plumule, appears 

 later. The plumule is a bud consist- 

 ing of several leaves on a reduced axis, 

 FIG. 204. SPORE AND GERMINATING & . . 



SPORE OF A MOSS-PLANT and lts outer sheath, in which the rest 



(Gymnostomum ovatum). of the plumule is still enclosed, emerges 



FIG. 203. HAIR-MOSS (Polytrichum 

 commune). 



(a a) Antheridia. (5 6) Hairs and sterile filaments 

 (paraphyses). 



