GENERATION. 141 



embryo is to be regarded as the male principle, but which 

 only dynamically determines the organization of the material 

 foundation. 



244. Professor Wydler of Berne, after an examina- 

 tion of the views of Schleiden, connected with observa- 

 tions made by himself upon the function of generation 

 in the vegetable kingdom, comes to the following con- 

 clusions : 



1st. Plants have not their sexes disposed in the 

 manner hitherto believed. 



2nd. The anther, so far from being a male organ is a 

 female one it is an ovary ; the grain of pollen is the 

 germ of a new plant, the tube of the pollen becomes the 

 embryo. 



3rd. The transformation of the tube into an embryo, 

 takes place within the embryo sac, and which seems to 

 determine its organization, and prepares for it its first 

 nourishment. 



4th. The teguments of the ovule serve as a protect- 

 ing abode to the embryo. 



5th. The embryo lies freely in the embryo sac, it pre- 

 sents, in respect to the ovule, an inverse position, its 

 base (radicular extremity) being directed towards the 

 micropyle, its summit (cotyledonary extremity) to the 

 chalaza. 



245. In the "Annales des Sciences Naturelles," are 

 the following remarks of M. Mirbeland Ad. Brongniart, 

 on the views of Schleiden and Wydler : 



" For many years," says Mirbel, " I have laboured with 

 M. Spach, to illustrate the origin of the several organic 

 systems of the flower, and the succession of their de- 

 velopments. I have read, with great attention, the two 

 important memoirs published by M. Schleiden. This 

 phytologist is, in my opinion, an excellent observer, an 

 original and ingenious writer ; nevertheless, many of his 

 conclusions appear to me hazardous. He has seen the 

 tube of the pollen penetrate through the endostome and 

 exostome into the interior of the ovule. I do not deny 

 the fact others have also seen it. He has seen in the 



