162 A BOTANICAL ANALYSIS. 



with the colour of the dead leaves heaped up at the base of 

 the hedgerows. Simultaneously with its leaves comes forth 

 a curious organ, rare in vegetables of temperate regions, 

 common in the tropical palms, and characteristic of the family 

 of the Aroidaceae, to which our Arum belongs. This organ, 

 rolled up in a coil or spiral, is named the spathe. It protects 

 the flowers in their young state, and, as they are developed, 

 gradually falls off. Its colour is a greenish yellow ; at the 

 summit it is sometimes streaked with purplish veins, and at 

 the base it swells out in a globose fashion. 



A small thermometer, introduced into the interior of the 

 rolled-up spathe, indicates a rise of temperature equal to 

 one or two degrees above that of the external atmosphere. 

 Whence comes this difference? Because in the spathe is 

 frequently found imprisoned another organ, the seat of the 

 mystery of reproduction. This organ is a fleshy axis, on 

 which are arranged the flowers in two distinct rings; the 

 upper is occupied by the stamens, reduced to simple anthers 

 (sessile stamens) ; observe the filamentous appendages they 

 are abortive ovaries. These same appendages also surmount 

 the lower ring, where several rows are set of sessile ovaries; 

 each ovary composed of a single lobe, containing a very small 

 number of ovules, the majority of which miscarry as the 

 ovaries become metamorphosed into bright red berries : these 

 are the fruits which appear in autumn ; they form a spike or 

 ear of coral, each containing, ordinarily, a single seed. The 

 flowers, as a consequence of this separation of the two sexes, 

 are monoecious; the succulent axis which bears them is called 



