90 THE PARTS OF THE PLANT. 



are linear;* and their flowers are not apparent, they do not 

 attract the gaze of the passer-by. Yet they possess all the 

 organs necessary for the reproduction of their species : three 

 stamens, each composed of an anther and a characteristic 

 filament; on this anther, whose two lobes are arranged like 

 the branches of an X, the pistil softly and tenderly balances 

 itself on the summit of a frail thread, to which it is attached 

 by the back. Remark, too, the two styles with feathery 

 stigmata, t like the barbs of feathers. Nothing is wanting 

 to constitute a complete flower. 



There is even a perianth, or calyx, represented by a couple 

 of tiny membraneous scales, scientifically known as glumellulce ; 

 then at the base of each spikelet, composed of one or two 

 of these bright green lilliputian flowers, are two other and 

 larger scales, called glumdlce: they represent an involucre.^ 

 It is almost unnecessary to add, that the free, unilocular 

 ovary, or seed vessel, forms, as a result of its development, 

 the seed, whose embryo adheres laterally to a farinaceous 

 kernel, or perisperm. The union of one or more of these 

 flowers composes a spikelet, and the union of the spike- 

 lets constitutes the spike, which may be disposed on a 

 simple or ramified axis. Such are, in general, the characters 

 we must keep before us in the difficult study of the Gra- 

 mineae. 



* Leaves are said to be linear, when the veins do not spread out, but 

 run from the base to the extreme point. 



t A stigma is the continuation of the cellular tissue of the style, and has 

 sometimes projecting cellules of hairs. 



A whorl, or ring, of bracts (floral leaves) is so called. 



