GYMNOSPERMS: WHITE PINE. 



2O7 



flower. These young female cones, at about the time that the pollen is 

 escaping from the anthers, are long ovate, measuring alxmt 6-iomm long. 

 They stand upright as shown in fig. 263. 



417. Form of a " scale " of the female flower. If we remove 

 one of the scales from the cone at this stage we can better study 

 it in detail. It is flattened, and oval in 

 outline, with a stout " rib," if it may be so 

 called, running through the middle line and 

 terminating in a point. The scale is in 

 two parts as shown in fig. 266, which is a 

 view of the under side. The small "out- 

 growth ' ' which appears as an appendage is 

 the cover scale, for while it is smaller in the 

 pine than the other portion, in some of 

 the relatives of the pine it is larger than its 

 mate, and being on the outside, covers it. 

 (The inner scale is sometimes called the ovu- 

 liferous scale, because it bears the ovules. ) 



418. Ovules, or macrosporangia, of the 

 pine. At each of the lower angles of the 



Fig. 264. 



Section of female cone 

 of white pine, showing 

 young ovules (macrospo- 

 rangia ) at base of the ovu- 

 liferous scales. 



Fig. 265. 



Scale of white pine with the 

 two ovules at base of ovulif- 

 erous scale. 



Fig. 266. 



Scale of white pine seen 

 from the outside, showing the 

 cover scale. 



scale is a curious oval body with two curved, forceps-like pro- 

 cesses at the lower and smaller end. These are the macro- 

 sporangia, or, as they are called in the higher plants, the ovules. 

 These ovules, as we see, are in the positions of the seeds on the 



