CLASS II. GYMNOSPERMS. 



OVULES not enclosed in an ovary, fertilized by the pollen without 

 the intervention of a pistil, and becoming truly NAKED SEEDS, the 

 carpel being represented by a flat open scale or entirely wanting. 

 EMBRYO with 2 opposite, or several whorled cotyledons. 



ORDER CXXXI. CONIFER^. CONIFERS. 



Trees or evergreen shrubs, with branching trunks, abounding in a resinous juice. 



Lvs. scattered or fascicled, linear or acerose (rarely lanceolate), parallel-veined, rigid, generally evergreen. 



Fls. monoecious or dioecious, destitute of calyx or corolla. 



Sterile, monandrous or monadelphous, collected in a kind of loose ament. 



Anth. 2 or many-lobed, often tipped with a crest. Pollen large, usually compound. 



Fertile, in aments composed of open, scale-like carpels, or solitary and without a carpel. 



Ovary, style and stigma wanting. Ovules 1, 2 or many, erect or inverted. 



JFV. A strobile (cone), or a solitary seed. Integuments hard and crustaceous. 



Embryo in the axis of oily albumen. 



Genera 29, species 150, natives of all climates, but most abundant in the temperate zones, those of the 

 southern, however, very different from the pines, spruces, larches and cedars of the northern. 



Properties. Few orders can be named, ^yhich are of more importance to mankind, whether in refer- 

 ence to their invaluable timber or their resinous secretions. Turpentine, tar, pitch and resin are the 



product of the pines. Burgundy pitch is yielded by Finus sylvestris of Europe ; Venetian turpentine, 

 by the Larix ; oil of Savin by Juniperus Sabina of Europe, i 



,&c. 



12 



FIG. 54. l. Branch of Thuja occidental's, with strobiles. 2. A magnified branchlet with a cone of 

 Btaminate flowers. 3. A carpellary scale with the two winged seeds. 4. A vertical transverse section 

 of one or the seeds, showing the embryo, &c. 5. The immature, erect ovules. 6. One of the ovules, 

 enlarged, showing the micropyle at top. 7. Branch of Abies Americana. 8. Scale, with the bract. 9. 

 Scale with immature ovules. 10. Scale with ripe seeds. 11. A pair of leaves of Pinus resinosa. 12. 

 Anther of Pinus sylvestris. 13. Scale of the cone, with the ovules turned downwards. 14. Staminate 

 scale of Cupregsus, with pollen. 15. Fertile scale, with many erect ovules. 



