190 OF THE SPATHA. 



formed their office. Every catkin consists generally 

 of either one kind of flower or the other. There are 

 few certain and invariable instances of stamens and 

 pistils in the same catkin, that circumstance occur- 

 ring chiefly in a few species of Saliv and Carex ; 

 nor is Typha, t. 1455 7, an exception to this. 

 Examples of barren-flowered catkins are seen, not 

 only in 5#//>and Pinus, but in several plants whose 

 fertile or fruit-bearing flowers are not catkins, such 

 as the Walnut, and, unless I am much mistaken, 

 the Hazel-nut, t. 723. Each nut or seed of the 

 latter has a permanent coriaceous calyx of its own, 

 inadvertently called by Gaertner an involucrum, 

 though he considers the whole as an amentum, 

 which this very calyx proves it not to be*. Humulus, 

 the Hop, t. 427, has a catkin for the fertile flower 

 only. 



4. Spat ha, f. 147. Sheath, a covering which bursts 

 longitudinally, and is more or less remote from the 

 flower. This is exemplified in the Snow-drop, 

 Galanthus nivalis, Engl. Bof. t. 19, the various 

 species of Narcissus, t. 17, 275 and 276, and the 

 Arum, t. 1298. The Spatha of the latter incloses 

 a Spadir, or elongated receptacle, common to many 



* It appears moreover that Carpinus, the Hornbeam, has hitherto 

 erroneously been supposed to have an amentum for the fertile flower. 

 The true nature of the covering of the seed, as well as of the common 

 stalk, proves it otherwise. 



