60 GENERAL BOTANY 



much the same, but the young plant is very much 

 lai^r from the first. 



A thick club-shaped organ comes out and grows 

 -downwards. The tip of this is the radicle, the rest 

 is the cotyledon which lengthens and pushes the 

 radicle deep into the soil. The other end of the 

 cotyledon remains in the seed and bulges out like a 

 ball and here again one may easily see the change 

 in the endosperm as it is digested by the coty- 

 ledon. The hard bluish-white changes to dull white 

 as the cellulose is digested and transformed into 

 sugar. 



After a while the base of the cotyledon splits open, 

 and allows the next young leaf to grow out. This 

 pierces the soil straight, like the leaves of the Onion 

 and the Date ; there is no drawing out of the leaf 

 backwards and spreading it out horizontally as with 

 the Pea and the Broad-bean. 



The germination of all Palms follows on much the 

 same lines. The first few ordinary leaves arise towards 

 t'>e lower end of an, often very long, thick organ, one 

 end of which remains in the seed absorbing the endo- 

 sperm, while the other grows down into the ground, 

 pushing before it, at first, the minute radicle and 

 stein, till the right depth for these is reached. In 

 some palms this cotyledon grows down to a depth of 

 six feet and more, before the ordinary leaves and roots 

 .arise from the short axis at its lower end. 



Get a Coco-nut which has germinated and has four 

 or five leaves. It appears to be very different from 

 the Date or Palmyra for the leaves come out at the top, 

 .and the roots grow out through the fibrous husk. But 



