'268 DECOMPOSITE ORGANS. CHAP. I. 



cylindrical, oblong, or ovate, as in most seeds ; or 

 they are spiral, as in Gyrocarpus Jacquini. In the 

 latter they are conjugate, as the Tamarisk ; or di- 

 gitate, as in the Horse-chesnut ; or crowded, as in 

 Lathyrus. 



Incipient But though the plumelet issues for the most part 

 immediately out of the radicle, without the inter- 

 vention of any thing like an incipient stem ; yet 

 there are some plantlets, such as those of the seeds 

 of Persimon, Fiscum, and Berberis, in which the 

 vesteges even of an incipient stem may be dis- 

 cerned ; so that it may truly be said that there is 

 no part of the full-grown plant that does not already 

 exist in miniature in the tender embryo, waiting 

 only the concurrence of favourable circumstances 

 to give it evolution. 



SECTION II. 



The Pericarp. 



Reducible THE Pericarp, which in different species of fruit 

 itsmodifi- assumes so many varieties of contexture, acquires 

 cations of its several aspects not so much from a diversity of 



substance as of modification. 



Capsule, The vc;l e of the Capsule, but particularly the 

 partitions by which it is divided into cells, are com- 

 posed of a thin and skinny membrane, or of an 

 epidermis covering a pulp more or less indurated, 

 and interspersed with longitudinal fibres. The 



