24 Reviews. — Lindley^s Theory of Horticidlure. 



form of a leaf; and books on structural botany al)ound in the records 

 of similar cases. It sometimes happens that buds are not only form- 

 ed, but developed, at the axils of the parts of a flower, as in a Celas- 

 trus scandens observed by Kunth. In the Pear, it is not uncommon 

 to find two or three small pears growing out of an older one, each 

 of which pears may be traced to the axil of some one of the parts of 

 the flower; and rose-buds are frequently seen growing out of Roses. 

 A very striking and uncommon case of this sort was observed by the 

 late Mr. Knight in the Potato, whose flowers produced young pota- 

 toes in the axils of the sejjals and petals. Occasionally, the centre 

 of a flower lengthens and bears its parts upon its sides, as in the 

 Pear and Apple, whose fruit is often found in the state of a short 

 branch. Still more rarely a flower lengthens, and produces from 

 the axils of its parts other flowers arranged over its sides, as in the 

 Double Pine-apple of the Indian Archipelago. 



The following very striking illustrations of these facts have, among 

 many others, occurred in the present season (1839.) A branch of a 

 Pear, exhibited a flower deformed, but still sufficiently recognisable, 

 and another completely changed into a branch; the calyx assuming 

 the appearance of leaves or leafy scales, the petals also partially 

 transformed into leaves, while the whole apparatus of stamens and 

 pistils is converted into an ordinary branch. Potentilla nepalensis 

 sometimes changes its flowers into branches; all the sepals, petals, 

 and stamens are converted into leaves, but the pistils are little'chang- 

 ed; the sepals, petals, and stamens are but little altered, but the re- 

 ceptacle of the fruit is lengthening into a branch, and is covered by 

 the carpels partly converted into leaves, and some of them near the 

 apex producing flowers from their axils; finally, the whole of the 

 floral apparatus is changed into a rosette of leaves. 



It therefore appears, that although the parts of a flower are diflfer- 

 ent both in appearance and office from leaves, yet that they do all 

 assume, under particular circumstances, the same appearance and 

 office. Hence it is inferred that they are really nothing more than 

 leaves in a modified state; and, consequently, that a flower is a very 

 short branch, and a flower-bud analogous in many respects to a 

 leaf-bud. A leaf-bud is a collection of leaf-scales of the same or 

 similar form, arranged round a central very short branch, having a 

 growing point. A flower-bud is a collection of leaf-scales of differ- 

 ent forms, arranged round a central very short branch, not having a 

 growing point under ordinary circumstances. In this latter respect 

 it resembles those buds of the Larch which form leaves in starry 

 clusters, Avithout extending into a bi'anch. Many points in horti- 

 culture could not be explained until the existence of this analogy was 

 made out.* 



* This doctrine has been taught at different times, by different independent observ- 

 ers. Among other persons, I find that Mr. Knight had come to the same conchision, 

 at a time when the views of VVolffius and Goethe were quite unknown in England. 

 He says: — " The buds of fruit trees wliich produce blossoms, and those which afford 

 leaves only, in the spring, do not at all differ from each other, in their first stage of 

 organization, as buds. Each contain the rudiment of leaves only, which are subse- 

 quently transformed into the component parts of the blossom, and and in some species 

 of the fruit also. I have repeatedly ascertained that a blossom of a Pear or Apple 



