92 



SEED. 



d the tigelle^ axis^ or stem, witli its node at J, crowned with 

 the bud to be developed into the phimule. 



To use the words of an ancient botanist, " The embryo con- 

 tinues imprisoned within its seed, and remains in a profound 

 slee]), until, awakened by germination, it meets the light and 

 air, to grow into a plant similar to its parent." 



" Lo ! on each seed, ■within its slender rind, 

 Life's golden threads in endless circles wind ; 

 Maze witliin maze the lucid webs are rolled, 

 And as they burst, the hving flame unfold. 

 • The pulpy acorn, ere it swells, contains 



The oak's vast branches in its milky veins, 

 Each raveled bud, fine film, and fiber-line, 

 Traced with nice pencil on the small design. 

 The young Narcissus, in its bulb comj^ressed, 

 Cradles a second nestling on its breast ; 

 In whose fine arms a younger embryo lies, 

 Folds its thin leaves, and shuts its floret-eyes ; 

 Grain loithin grain, successive harvests dwell, 

 And boundless forests slumber in a shell."* 



102. Tliere are various ajpjpendages which may, or may not, 

 be present without injury to the structure of the seed. Ai- 

 grette,, or egret., sometimes called pa-ppus.^ is a kind of feathery 

 crown w^ith which many of the compound flowers are furnished, 

 evidently for the purj)ose of disseminating the seed to a consid- 

 erable distance, by means of winds ; as the dandelion, and others 

 of the Compositoe family. The egret includes all that remains 

 on the top of the seed after the corolla is removed, and is sup- 

 posed to be the attenuated frame- work of the limb of the calyx. 



StijM^ is a thread connecting the egret with the seed. The 

 egret is said to be sessile when it has no stipe, simple when it 

 consists of a bundle of hairs without branches, plumose when 

 each hair has other little hairs arranged along its sides like the 

 beards on a feather. 



Fig. 118. 



In Fig. 118, a repre- 

 sents the capillary, or 

 hair-like egret ; 6 is a 

 pedicelled egret ; c and 

 d show the style re- 

 maining, and forming 

 a plumose train, as in 

 the virgin's-bower and 

 Geum ; e, a wing, as 

 may be seen in the fir ; 

 f, a sessile egret. 



* These lines, which so beautifully set forth the manner in which the embryo is contained within the 

 seed or bulb, are not strictly philosophical, as to the fact of the future generations lying infolded, the 

 one within the other ; it is true that we may in many seeds discern the form of tiie future plant, but wo 

 cannot believe that this miniature image contains another embryo, and so on through successive genera- 

 tions ; for the tact is establisiied, that a seed does nof produce a plant without being fertilized by the 

 pollen. We may say that a seed contains within itself the elements of future generations ; but not 

 their image:/, except that of the immediate plant which is to issue from the perfected seed. 



102. Appendage! to the seed — Stipe. 



