PROBLEMS OF PLANT MORPHOLOGY 95 



phylogenetically does not need to have been at any time an axillary 

 shoot. 



The question of the significance of metamorphosis leads us into 

 another field of morphology. The above-cited examples show that 

 the transformation of organs always goes on hand in hand with a 

 change of function. This gives us the occasion to take up a further 

 problem of modern morphology: the relation between form and 

 function. The old morphology believed that it should keep away 

 from this question, because it held that the function of an organ had 

 nothing to do with its "morphological meaning." Just recently we 

 have heard that morphology has to do with "members" and not 

 with the "organs" of a plant. The fact that "members" and "or- 

 gans" mean one and the same thing, and that for the organism their 

 members are organs, or tools, shows that here again is a purely arti- 

 ficial and therefore untenable abstraction. Morphology stiffens to a 

 dead schematism when it does not take the plant for what it really 

 is, a living body the functions of which are carried on in intimate 

 relation to the outside world. It was the powerful influence of Dar- 

 winism that turned more attention again to the function of single 

 plant organs, for, according to one view, which has many adherents, 

 all form-relations arise through adaptation. D. H. Scott has given 

 clear expression to this view in the sentence, "All the characters 

 which the morphologist has to compare are, or have been, adaptive." 



This is a widely disseminated conception, but is by no means 

 as widely accepted. Above all, it must be pointed out that it is not 

 the result of observation, but is a theory, which enjoys by no means 

 general acquiescence. True, the conclusion drawn depends upon 

 the meaning given to the word "adaptive." But, take it as you will, 

 in the Lamarckian or in the Darwinian sense, in reviewing the 

 phenomena of adaptation we come face to face with the problem: 

 are the form-characters fixed adaptational characters solely, or have 

 we to distinguish between organization and adaptational characters? 

 There are several grounds which have led to the belief that organi- 

 zation and adaptational characters coincide. Chiefly the brilliant 

 results which investigation concerning the functional significance 

 of structures as well in the flower as in the vegetation organs has 

 had in the last decade. It was evident that structures to which 

 were earlier ascribed no sort of function yet have such. And if none 

 was found, there yet remained the possibility that the structures 

 concerned had earlier been useful as adaptations. It is, however, 

 clear that we are hereby near to the danger of accepting something 

 as proved which needs rather to be proved. In reality, it seems to 

 me that morphological comparison as well as experiment shows 

 that the distinction between organization and adaptational charac- 

 ters is justified, and that the opinion to which Scott has given ex- 



