IN TWO SPECIES OF PASSIFLORA. 147 
of oval form; the external covering having the same crenulated surface as the neigh- 
bouring perfect ovules, and attached.to the placenta by a constricted pedicle, up the axis 
of which passed a bundle of vascular tissue, —in fact, attached by a true funiculus. Such 
a specimen is exhibited in Pl. X XIV. figs. 5 & 6, and is intelligible enough, though some- 
what distorted in fig. 5 by the compression necessary to render it sufficiently diaphanous 
for contemplation with transmitted light. 
In the centre is a large mass of pollen, surrounded by a more transparent area of 
cellular tissue. Whether this latter represents the ovular coats I am not prepared posi- 
tively to say ; but, from the absence of a micropyle, I presume that it does not. The 
funiculus attaching this body to the placenta is traversed by vascular tissue; the spiral 
vessels, however, instead of remaining through their course an unbroken fasciculus, as in 
the case of a normal podosperm, and then expanding into the chalaza, are a good deal 
branched in their progress. "There appears to me to be no question that the organ I have 
just described is a modified ovule: the erect position of its stalk and the apparent absence 
of coats would, however, seem to indicate that the sexual aberration which it had under- 
gone in its early development (as manifested by the formation of pollen) had arrested 
the elaboration of its normal ovular anatomy,—that, instead of becoming, in the progress 
of its growth, anatropous and clothed with coats, the nucleus had remained orthotropous 
and naked. At least, that is the interpretation I should be disposed to give to these 
appearances. 
The fourth form is that in which the ovule is only modified by the presence of a very 
few pollen-grains in its substance, in other respects being natural. Such specimens are 
found deep in the cavity of these malformed ovaries, either among or very near those 
ovules which display no departure from a perfectly normal anatomy. Examples of this 
very slight amount of male element within the ovule I have found to be extremely rare: 
as a rule, in the polleniferous ovules the pollen has been very abundant, and in that 
case the form and relation of the ovule has been a good deal modified. One of these 
exceptional instances of a very minute development of pollen within an ovule is figured 
in the aecompanying drawing, Pl. XXIV. fig. 7. 
When first examined, a dark spot appeared in the nucleus, about one-fourth of the 
length of the ovule from the foramen. From the examination of previous specimens I 
was aware that this was pollen, but, imbedded in the substance of the ovule, its structure 
was obscured by the opacity of the tissues surrounding it. To demonstrate the nature 
of this little opaque mass it was necessary to burst the ovule, and this was without diffi- 
culty accomplished by compressing it between glass slides under the microscope. By 
this means the pollen was freed from its endothecium, and emerging from the interior of 
the ovule occupied the position indicated in the accompanying illustration, and now, 
freed from any covering, its nature as true pollen can be seen by high magnifying powers. 
I may here mention that in perfectly formed anatropous ovules I have never found 
many grains of pollen ; six or eight have been the extreme numbers, and in three several 
instanees two, three, and four grains: but from the rarity of meeting with وومةه‎ 
well-formed ovules bearing pollen, I have only had opportunities of viewing eight or ten 
examples in many dozens of malformed ovaries whose contents I have examined with 
