PROLIFICATION OF THE FLOWER. 147 
more or less leaf-like carpel; while at other times a 
second imperfect carpel has been met with in the axil 
of the first. I have myself seen numerous imperfectly 
developed cases of this kind. 
It may be asked whether such cases are not more 
properly ‘referable to central prolification—whether the 
axis is not in such flowers terminated by two, rather 
than by one carpel? It is, however, generally admitted 
by morphologists that the solitary carpel of Leguminose 
is not terminal, but is the sole existing member of a 
whorl of carpels, all the other members of which are 
suppressed as a general rule, though exceptional in- 
stances of the presence of two and even of five carpels 
have been described.” 
Again, the adventitious bud or carpel is placed, not 
laterally to the primary one, or opposite to it, on the 
same level, but shgehtly higher up—in fact, in the axil 
of the primary carpellary leaf. Griffith figures and 
describes* an instance of the kind im a species of 
Melilotus. The stalk of the ovary is mentioned as 
haying a sheathing base, bearing in its axil a prolonga- 
tion of the axis of inflorescence, in the form of a short 
spike with hairy bracts and imperfect flowers, the 
latter having a well-formed calyx and rudimentary 
petals and stamens. Griffith infers, from this specimen, 
that the legume is not to be considered as a terminal 
leaf. 
' «Linnea,’ vol. xv, p. 266, c. ic. Caspary, ‘Schriften d. Physik.-Oek. 
Gesell. zu Konigsberg,’ bd. ui, p. 5, tab. 1, fig. 39, &e. 
? Lindley, ‘Veg. King.,’ p. 545; also Clarke on the Position of 
Carpels, Linn. Soc.,’ December, 1850. ‘ Proc. Linn. Soc.,’ ii, p. 105. 
3 * Notule,’ vol. i, Dicot. p. 127. ‘ Atlas,’ pl. xlii. 
