THE ANTHER. 293 



which answers to the margin of the leaf, is exactly lateral in in- 

 nate anthers, as in Fig. 370 ; but it looks more or less evidently, 

 and often directly, inward in introrse, and outward in extrorse an- 

 thers (Fig. 371, 373). 



528. Various deviations from this normal structure of the anther 

 frequently occur ; some of which may be cursorily noticed. The 

 opening of the anther, sometimes called its dehiscence, does not 

 always take place by a longitudinal fissure for the whole length of 

 the cell. Occasionally the suture opens only at the top, in the 

 form of a chink or pore ; as in Pyrola, Rhododendron, &c. (Ord. 

 Ericaceae), and in the Potato, &c. Sometimes the summit of the 

 lobes is prolonged into a tube, which opens by a pore or chink at 

 the apex ; as in the Heath and Huckleberry (Ord. Ericaceae). In 

 the Barberry (Ord. Berberidaceae ) and other plants of the family, 

 the Benzoin, &c., nearly the whole face of each anther-cell sepa- 

 rates by a continuous line, forming a kind of door, which is attached 

 at the top, and turns back, as if on a hinge : in this case the anthers 

 are said to open by valves. In the Sassafras (Ord. Lauracese), 

 and other plants of the Laurel Family, each lobe of the anther 

 opens by two such valves, like trap-doors. 



529. Sometimes the anthers are one-celled by the suppression 

 of one lobe, being dimidiate, or reduced as it were to half-stamens, 

 as m Gomphrena, and some other Amaranthaceous plants ; but 

 they more frequently become one-celled by the confluence of the 

 two lobes, and the disappearance of the partition between them. 

 The kidney-shaped one-celled anthers of the Mallow Family may 

 be conceived to arise from the divergence of the base of the two 

 lobes, and their perfect confluence at the apex ; and the opening 

 consequently takes place by a continuous sutural line passing round 

 the margin (Ord. Malvaceae). A somewhat similar case occurs in 

 Monarda and some other plants of the Mint Family, where only 

 one of the two lobes remains parallel with the filament or con- 

 nective ; while the other, describing a semicircle, is brought into 

 the same vertical line, where it stands bottom upwards ; and the 

 two, cohering by their contiguous extremities, become confluent 

 into a single cell, which opens by a continuous straight line from 

 one end to the other. The anther of Teucrium differs from the 

 last chiefly in the enlarged connective, on which the divaricate 

 lobes rest ; and the cells, at first distinct, are confluent into one 

 after the anther opens. In the Thyme, the anther-lobes are also 



25* 



