212 THE CAPSULE AND ITS KINDS. 



country, lie long exposed before they met with suf- 

 ficient moisture to vegetate. 



1. Capsula, a Capsule, is a dry seed-vessel of a 

 woody, coriaceous or membranous texture, gene- 

 Tally splitting into several valves ; more rarely dis- 

 charging its contents by orifices or pores, as in 

 Campanula and Papaver ; or falling off entire with 

 the seed. Internally it consists either of one cell or 

 several ; in the latter case the parts which separate 

 the cells are called dissepiment a, partitions. The 

 central column to which the seeds are usually at- 

 tached is named columclla. See Datura Stramo- 

 nium,/. 179, Engl Bot. t. 1288. 



Gaertner, a writer of primary authority on fruits 

 and seeds, reckons several peculiar kinds of Cap- 

 sules ; besides what are generally understood as 

 such; these are 



Utriculus, a Little Bladder, which varies in thick- 

 ness, never opens by any valves, and falls off with 

 the seed. I believe it never contains more than one 

 seed, of which it is most commodiously, in botanical 

 language, called an external coat, rather than a 

 Capsule. Gaertner applies it to Chenopodium, as 

 well as to Clematis, c. In the former it seems a 

 Pellicula, in the latter a Testa, as we shall hereafter 

 explain. 



Samara is indeed a species of Capsule, of a com- 

 pressed form and dry coriaceous texture, with one 



