FATE OF SEEDS INDICATED BY BALANCE 233 



The fleshy, though tough living seed, has the singular structure 

 presented by the seeds of some other myrtaceous trees, such 

 as Barringtonia^ where an enlarged hypocotyl, invested by a 

 thick rind and forming the storehouse of the food-reserve, 

 constitutes the seed. As the seed dries it becomes as hard as 

 a stone, and on section displays the appearance of a fossil fruit, 

 these stone-like seeds being usually i to i^ inches long. Yet 

 on testing the water-contents of one of these old seeds, which 

 must have been at least six or seven years old, and had been 

 almost five years in my possession, I obtained a result of 1 2 per 

 cent., almost all the water lost in the oven being subsequently 

 regained from the air in the course of a few weeks. I may 

 direct the attention of the botanist engaged in microscopical 

 and chemical research to these remarkable changes in the seeds 

 of this plant. Sometimes a portion of the seed rots, whilst 

 the other portions experience the change ; and when such a 

 seed is found in the early stage of transformation, a very 

 puzzling structure is displayed. 



Similar questions might be raised with reference to the 

 condition of old seeds of Barringtonia speciosa^ which possess the 

 structural features above described in the case of the seed of 

 the Anchovy tree. The seeds do not become quite so hard 

 with time, but are sufficiently altered to cause one to look 

 twice in order to be assured that one is not dealing with some 

 non-vegetable substance. Yet old kernels collected three 

 years before lost 10 per cent, of their weight in the oven, 

 and in a few weeks returned almost to their original weight by 

 replacing the lost water with moisture abstracted from the air. 



There is, however, an indication in my experiments on 

 impermeable seeds that might seem to point in the direction 

 of the change in seeds as interpreted from Professor Ewart's 

 point of view. In Chapter IV. it is shown in the case of bared 

 kernels of Guilandina bonducella that whilst freshly bared Guilandina 

 kernels added 13-4 per cent, to their weight in five days, this 

 excess was reduced to 7*3 per cent, in three months, and to 

 3 or 4 per cent, after a year, an excess which was retained 



bonducella. 



