8 MINUTES OF 



On the Structure of Vegetables. 



and ineffectual, or is washed away. Whence as wheat, rye, and many of the 

 grasses, and plantain, lift up their anthers on long filaments, and thus expose the 

 enclosed fecundating dust to be washed aAvay by the rains; a scarcity of corn is 

 produced in wet summers; to which the ustilago or smut in wheat, have rationally 

 been ascribed. Hence the necessity of a careful choice of seed-wheat; as that, 

 ti'hich had not received the dust of the anthers, will not grow, though it may ap- 

 pear well to the eye. 



From these premises, the improvers of agriculture, and even the common 

 practical farmer, may be able to deduce very useful consequences. If the farmer 

 dreads heavy and sudden rains, immediately after he has sown his seed, he may, 

 with equal reason, be afraid of them at the time his corn is in bloom. For, as the 

 wet will injure him in one case by bursting the seed, so it will in the other by 

 washing off the farina, or male dust, whereby an effectual impregnation will be 

 prevented. The fanner will not then be surprized if his grain appears small and 

 pined at the time of threshing, when he can so readily account for the cause iu 

 philosophic terms. 



3. The Pollen, farina fa?cundans, or meal, contained within the anthera, is 

 a fine dust secreted therein, and destined for the impregnation of the gcrmen. Each 

 portion of this meal is by a microscope seen to be concealed in a very fine pellicle 

 (which at the time of impregnation bursts) containing the prolific liquor. This 

 very subtile, elastic Vapour, ,contained in the farina or pollen of the anthera, is 

 the principle which fertilizes the plant. 



IV. The Pist ilium, pistil or pointal, is the female part of the floAver, design- 

 ed for the reception of the pollen, and is the termination of the wood or lignum. It 

 consists of three parts, 



1. The Germen, which i$ the rudiment of the fruit, accompanying the 

 flower, but not yet arrived at maturity. It is situated at the bottom of the style, 

 and is generally called germen until the anthera; have discharged their pollen; 

 after which period, it becomes the pericarpium, which contains the tender seeds. 



