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THE ORGANS OF PLANTS. 



Seed, Rooty Stem, Fluids, Leaf, Flower, Fruit, Appendages, etc. 



SEEDS, separated from their parents, are organized and independent 

 living bodies, possessing powers of reproducing their parent stock and 

 their own vital principles. These products, though characteristic of 

 those of their own species, may vary from them in their qualities and 

 from those of the original. For the exercise of these powers they re- 

 quire to be placed so as to receive moisture, air, light and heat, with 

 a proper situation within the earth. The embryo then swells and 

 bursts through its envelopes, extends itself downwards and then up- 

 wards, thereby forming a central point from which subsequently 

 emanate other parts. Proceeding upwards with almost resistless 

 power it ultimately appears above ground. 



The importance of seeds is readily perceived in the continuation of 

 the vegetable world. In one brief year would be swept from the face 

 of the earth the whole of the annual plants, those most important for 

 the food of man, were not the powers above refered to continued by 

 the seed. Another year would divest us of the biennal plants, the 

 most valuable of vegetables, and within a few years more the whole 

 vegetable kingdom would present a wide scene of ruin. Thus this 

 important link in the chain of vegetable existences is seen to connect 

 and sustain the whole world of animate beings, man, animals and 

 plants. And here our admiration of the wise and determinate laws of 

 Supreme Power, as established and manifested in nature, is most 

 fitly excited. 



The structure of seeds Seeds present three principal parts, 



the eye, husk and kernel. The first is connected to the internal en- 

 velope or ovule of the fruit by a thread, or funicle which is separated 

 when the seed is ripe and exhibits the hole or pore through which the 

 seed received its nourishment, as in the garden bean. The husk is 

 the external coat or cuticle which is separated by boiling, as in beans, 

 Indian corn, etc. Its importance is obvious from the fact that the 

 kernel which it encloses was at first in a liquid state. The kernel or 

 nucleus, includes all within the husk and is composed of the albumen, 

 cotyledon and embryo. The albumen invests the cotyledon and affords, 

 it is said, the same support to the embryo that the white of an egg 

 does to a chicken. It defends the embryo ; and, in germination, serves 

 as its nutriment. 



The cotyledons, or seed-lobes are simple or double ; they are the 



fleshy part of the seed. They generally appear above ground as the 



seed-leaves, the first visible parts which nourish the infancy of the 



plant. When this is done and the young plant can support itself by the 



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