PIIANEUOGAMTA : AXIAL ORGANS. 231 



a long while devoid of stem ; sometimes they never acquire one.* The 

 Duckweeds have a very short cauloma, which grows out into a stem." f 

 Next comes a third anamorphosis, the corm ! The bulb is to be reckoned 

 with this. J Fourth anamorphosis, the rhizome. " From the base of the 

 trunk, under ground, stems often come out which grow downward from 

 the first" &c. 



What are all these anamorphoses ? Are they stems, or not ? If they 

 originate from stems, what forms of stem precede them ? What is the 

 common character of the stem and its anamorphoses ? what is its universal 

 distinctive mark ? To all the questions which immediately crowd into 

 every even half-logical head, not one answer is to be found. But I think 

 I have given enough of this. Superficial treatment of imperfectly 

 observed facts characterises the whole of this exposition. Moreover, 

 there are very many botanical manuals in which all is still more illogical 

 and unscientific than here, and this may suffice for a general criticism of 

 the whole existing literature of the stem. 



No one has hitherto sought to elucidate the structure of the axis from 

 its course of development ; but, instead of this, space has been given to 

 the strangest fancies, and it has even been asserted that the stem is 

 nothing but a number of petioles grown together. One may, indeed, 

 calmly declare that the people who assert such a thing do not understand 

 themselves ; since, otherwise, they would see that when they assert a 

 blending together, they must point out, that is, demonstrate, how two 

 separate parts become united by the process of growth, while they have 

 not yet made one single search for such, the only possible demonstration. 

 The investigation would clearly at once refute the affair. A portion of 

 these men might readily come to their senses if they were only to trace 

 one complete course of development. There is another portion, how- 

 ever, whom this will not render capable of clear vision. These are the 

 people who think that they are able to make the forms with their words, 

 instead of receiving them from nature. They do not suspect that 

 natural history definitions, as a rule, are not artificially pieced together, 

 but discovered inductively ; and they feel themselves very clever when 

 they can assert that the stem, which has always been an undivided 

 whole, can still be regarded as compounded of petioles, although such is 

 not the case. To this class Gaudichaud || appears to belong, whose so- 



drical cauloma is thicker with the leaves on than without them, it is a superfluous 

 triviality. 



* Above it is said, " The stem is never wanting." Here, however, is meant merely 

 that they never acquire a long stem, which is also the case in other plants without a 

 cauloma. 



f I am unable even to form an idea of what similarity Link finds between a Palm- 

 stem and a Duckweed. The latter never has any stem formed. The whole plant con- 

 sists of one single internode, and there is no terminal bud to this. 



\ If Link had only observed with some attention the development of the stem of 

 Allium angulosum or senescens from germination forward, he would have seen that there 

 is not the slightest difference between it and the so-called cauloma of Yucca, leaving 

 out of view variation of mass. In Palms and the species of Allium the lowest internodes 

 die gradually ; in the Palms only for a period ; in the bulbs uninterruptedly, otherwise 

 every bulb would become a Palm-stem. Link has recently, also, brought forward all 

 this again as original wisdom in an otherwise worthless essay, without recollecting his 

 former absurdities, and the correct views of others which already existed. 



Above it is said all stems and all branches, at least at first, grow upward ; nay, 

 therein lay the solitary character of the stem. 



|| Gaudichaud, Recherches sur I'Organographie, la Physiologic, et 1'Organogenie 

 des Vegetaux. Paris, 1841. Beyond all description, superficial and frivolous. (See my 

 review in the new Jena Lit. Zeit. 1842.) 



Q 4 



