260 PHYSIOGNOMY OP PLANTS. 



seeds without the neighborhood of pollen-bearing vessels, has been 

 refuted by later experiments. When seeds have been obtained, 

 anthers in a rudimentary state, capable of furnishing some grains 

 of fertilizing dust, have been discovered near the ovarium. Such 

 hermaphroditism is frequent in the entire family of Urticeae, but a 

 peculiar and still unexplained phenomenon has been presented in 

 the forcing-houses at Kew by a small New Holland shrub, the Ccele- 

 bogyne of Smith. This phsenogamous plant produces in England 

 perfect seeds without trace of male organs, or the hybridizing intro- 

 duction of the pollen of other species. An ingenious botanist, 

 Adrien de Jussieu, in his "Cours Elementaire de Botanique," 1840, 

 p. 463, expresses himself on the subject as follows : " Un genre 

 d'Euphorbiacees (?) assez nouvellement decrit, mais cultive depuis 

 plusieurs annees dans les serres d'Angleterre, le Cojlebogyne, y a 

 plusieurs fois fructifie, et ses graines etaient eVidemment parfaites, 

 puisque non seulement on y a observe' un embryon bien constitue, 

 mais qu'en le semant cet embryon s'est developpe" en une plante 

 semblable. Or les fleurs sont dioiques; on ne connait et ne possede 

 pas (en Angle terre) de pieds mUles, et les recherches les plus minuti- 

 euses, faites par les meilleurs observateurs, n'ont pu jusqu'ici faire 

 d^couvrir la moindre trace d'antheres ou seulement de pollen. I/ em- 

 bryon ne venait done pas de ce pollen, qui manque entierement : il 

 a du se former de toute piece dans 1' ovule." 



In order to obtain a fresh confirmation or elucidation of this 

 highly important and isolated phenomenon, I addressed myself not 

 long since to my young friend Dr. Joseph Hooker, who, after mak- 

 ing the Antarctic voyage with Sir James Ross, has now joined the 

 great Thibeto-Himalayan expedition. Dr. Hooker wrote to me in 

 reply, on his arrival at Alexandria near the end of December 1847, 

 before embarking at Suez : " Our Ccelebogyne still flowers with my 

 father at Kew as well as in the Gardens of the Horticultural Society. 

 It ripens its seeds regularly : I have examined it repeatedly very 

 closely and carefully, and have never been able to discover a penetra- 

 tion of pollen-tubes either in the style or ovarium. In my herba- 

 rium the male blossoms are in small catkins." 



