574 ON SEEDLINGS 



AMARYLLIDE.E. 



Benth. et Hook. Gen. PL iii. 711. 



Fruit and Seed. The ovary is inferior and three-celled 

 with axile placentation, very rarely one-celled with parietal 

 placentas. The ovules are numerous in each cell and super- 

 posed in two ranks, rarely reduced to one or two, and always 

 anatropous. The fruit is capsular or succulent, undivided or 

 trilobed, variously dehiscent or indehiscent. The seeds are 

 globose, or angled, or flattened by mutual pressure, and have 

 a membranous or thickened, often black testa. Endosperm 

 is copious and fleshy or rarely horny. The embryo is small, 

 rarely half as long as the endosperm. Important exceptions 

 to the above characters occur in Calostemma which has by 

 abortion a one-celled ovary with one or two ovules, and in 

 Leontochir which has a triangular, one-celled ovary with 

 three parietal placentas. 



The fruit of Crinum is capsular and irregularly subglobose 

 according to the number of seeds it contains. The seeds are 

 very large and irregularly compressed with a thick testa. In 

 some cases at least they commence to germinate soon after 

 they are mature and have dropped on the ground, or even 

 when kept in a drawer or other dry place. This they are 

 able to do by reason of the large quantity of endosperm and 

 the moisture they contain. The seeds in the capsule of 

 Nerine are few or solitary and greenish. The capsule gener- 

 ally if not always bursts open, exposing the seeds long before 

 they are ripe ; after thus dehiscing the valves do not seem to 

 increase in size. 



Seedlings. The solitary cotyledon is frequently subter- 

 ranean, and in other cases where it rises above ground, it 

 carries up the seed with it as shown by Agave Wislizeni 

 (fig. 680). The hypocotyl in this case is undeveloped, the 

 primary root is stout and fleshy, and adventitious roots are 

 soon given off close to the base of the cotyledon. 



The latter is subulate, elongated, dilated and sheathing 



