PHYSIOLOGICAL BOTANY. 211 



what is developed, and from what this is derived ; and the 

 physiological examination of the species follows last. Now 

 I confess that I am unacquainted with any manual of 

 botany which, with aphoristic brevity, fulfils its design so 

 admirably, as the 'Principles of Botany' of Endlicher and 

 linger. My disagreement with the authors in a few, in 

 fact, in many of their theories, is nothing to the point, for, 

 in so extensive a field, it is impossible always to meet 

 with accuracy. Schleiden finds fault, e. g. with the dis- 

 tinction which the authors make between a conical and a 

 discoid receptacle, when speaking of the floral receptacle, 

 and puts a variety of questions, which in my opinion may be 

 easily answered. The discoid receptacle is furnished be- 

 neath the ovary with an annular ridge, which is absent in 

 the conical receptacle, and if I understand the authors 

 correctly, they regard this as an indication of another 

 inter node of the stem which commences there. Thus they 

 have explained the presence of the various parts situated 

 beneath the ovary, for by explanation we signify the illus- 

 tration of the essential connexion of phenomena. But I 

 doubt whether an appendage does not always exist beneath 

 the ovary, indicating the origin of another internode. 



Schleiden' s theory of the internodes of the stem, meri- 

 thalles, as they are called by the French in their usual 

 manner, by a barbarous term derived from the Greek and 

 in opposition to all analogy, is old. The place where a 

 leaf and a bud exist, was called a node, and this was 

 regarded as the commencement of an internode. In the 

 Grasses, each node is evidently the commencement of an 

 internode ; in the Palms, internodes are closely crowded 

 and somewhat less easily recognised ; the nodes and the 

 internodes are also distinguishable in the Labiatse, the 

 Caryophyllacese, &c., which have opposite leaves, whilst 

 in plants with alternate leaves, they run into each other. 

 If we consider the term node to denote the articulation, 

 we might say with Endlicher and linger, that in the 

 conical receptacle, there is no node situated above the 

 stamens, until we come to the ovary, whilst in the discoid 

 receptacle, one does exist. 



