36 INFLORESCENCE, 



The structure of the flowers of Taxads and Conifers will be readily 

 understood by reference to the accompanying figures, or still better, 

 by comparing with them specimens gathered fresh from the trees. 



TAXACE^. The common Yew affords an easily accessible type. The 

 staminate flowers of the Yew, Tcwus- laccafa, are borne in the axils of 

 foliage leaves and consist of an elongated axis surrounded at the base by 



an envelope of imbricating scales spirally 

 arranged in three or four series, above which 

 is a capitulum or head of peltate scales 

 (staminal leaves) each bearing about six (three- 

 eight) pollen sacs which dehisce lengthwise 

 when mature.* The ovuliferous flowers are 

 solitary and axillary, but occasionally terminal, 

 and like the staminate flowers consist of an 

 elongated axis wholly enveloped by numerous 

 scale-like imbricating bracts spirally arranged 

 in |- phyllotaxis, of which the terminal one 

 bears an erect ovule and is surrounded by a 

 fleshy appendage termed an aril, which after 

 Fig. 21. i, staminate. 2, Ovuliferous the fertilisation of the ovule develops into 

 flower of the common Yew. the re(1 fleshy covering of the seed. Rudi- 



mentary ovules are sometimes found on some of the lateral scales. 



The flowers of Cephalotaxus and Torreya deviate but little from this 

 type except that in the ovuliferous flowers of the first named the bracts 

 are in decussate pairs. But in Ginkgo the staminate flowers are 

 produced in catkin-like umbels on the ends of short arrested branchlets 

 or " spurs," and the ovuliferous flowers are simply stalk-like elongations 

 bearing at their apex two, rarely more, ovules from one of which the 

 fruit is generally developed. In Podocarpus the staminate flowers are 

 catkin-like upon a short stalk surrounded at the base by involucral 

 scales, solitary or clustered (umbellate in P. Nag&id) and with the 

 two-lobed anthers spirally arranged around the axis. The ovuliferous 

 flowers, usually solitary or in a lax spike, consist of a slender stalk- 

 like axis, bearing at the apex small decussate scales, the ovules being 

 seated on the uppermost pair, one of which is usually abortive, and 

 the fertile scale becomes fleshy ; the flower is thence one-seeded as in 

 Ginkgo. In Dacrydium the staminate flowers are small and the two- 

 celled anthers are crowded spirally around a central axis ; the ovuliferous 

 flowers are composed of one, three or more seed-scales, each bearing 

 an erect ovule which after fertilisation becomes invested by a tubular 

 arillus. In the curious moiiotypic genus Saxegothsea the floral organs 

 are a sort of compound of those of Podocarpus and Agathis, whilst 

 the fruit and seed are those of a Juniper .and Dacrydium. Saxe- 

 gothsea is thence a connecting link between the Taxaceae and 

 Coniferse. 



CONIFERS. The inflorescence of Pinus Laricio, or of one of its 

 varieties, which has been planted almost everywhere, and which bears 

 staminate flowers and cones in abundance almost annually, may be 

 selected to illustrate the floral structure of the Abietinese. 

 * The staminate flowers of Taxads and Conifers are frequently called catkins, the vernacular 

 name of the flowers of the Amentaceous Orders which are spikes of unisexual apetalous 

 flowers. The view now generally accepted is that in Taxads and Conifers the aggregate 

 of stamens constitute but a single flower. 



