76 INFLOEESCENCE. 



flower as it appears before its perfect expansion ; at B, after 

 that 2)eriod. 



Interesting as is the subject of the various means contrived 

 bj Providence for the continuation of the vegetable tribes, the 

 limits of our work will not permit lis to extend our inquiries 

 in this department of our science. But if there are any who 

 hold Botany to be a trifling science, let them examine into the 

 grand principles which it develops, unfolding to the view of 

 man the workings of Creative wisdom in one vast domain of 

 nature. The greatest Botanist, in the midst of his discoveries, 

 must experience a feeling of humiliation at his own ignorance 

 of nature. Facts which, when discovered, seem so simple that 

 we wonder a child should not have discovered them, have 

 eluded the research of the wisest men ; — and at this moment, 

 we doubt not, philosophers are groping for truths, which in 

 due time will be elicited and incorporated into the elements of 

 science, to be learned and understood by children. 



LECTUEE XIY 



INFLOKESCENCE. 



82. The arrangement of flowers upon their axis, or the branch- 

 mg out of the Jlo7'al axis, is called Inflorescence or antJiotaxis 

 (from anthos, flower, and taxis, order). Flower-buds, like leaf- 

 buds, are produced in the axils of leaves which are called floral 

 leaves or bracts. When the flower is forming, there is an ex- 

 pansion horizontally while the perpendicular growth is check- 

 ed. In respect to the development of flowers, two divisions 

 have been made, viz., the centripetal and centrifugal inflores- 

 cence ; in the centripetal, the blossoming commences with the 

 flower of the circumference or hase, and proceeds toward the 

 center, or summit, as in the carrot and cabbage ; in the centrif- 

 ugal, the central flowers open first, and the lower or external 

 ones last, as in the pink. In these cases the bud w^hich ter- 

 minates the stem is transformed into a flower, and being the 

 earliest formed, is the first to expand. The stem itself cannot 

 elongate further, but new branches are developed in the axils 

 of the bracts or upper leaves by the accumulation of nourish- 

 ment. These are terminated by a solitary flower which again 

 produces branches from the axils of its bracts in the same man- 

 Reflection.— 82. Inflorescence — Centripetal and centrifugal. 



