438 BOTANICAL GAZETTE - [DECEMBER 
the members of the corolla undergo division into a major and minor 
group. And plainly, from these simple phases we may no doubt 
ultimately pass by as simple steps and combinations to a reasonable 
interpretation of all the multifarious reductions, ‘suppressions, and 
alterations in first one set of organs, and then another, resulting in 
papilionaceous, orchidaceous, and all the manifold forms of angio- 
spermous flowers. 
It is obviously not feasible adequately to show the derivation and 
the complex relations of sporophylls leading from the primitive to 
the higher types in any simple manner. Above all is this true because 
of the necessity of taking into account the varied possibilities and 
phases of monoecism and dioecism in any even approximately com- 
plete presentation. And the different rates of reduction at different 
periods, we are bound to assume, further complicate the problem. 
Indeed no one diagram and no one set. of diagrams would serve to 
outline adequately the changes now suggested. Nevertheless, the 
attempt is made in jig. 10 to give the simplest and most abbreviated 
expression of sporophyll change possible. 
Have not the transformations really been easier than we think? 
Dictyozamites, the net-veined cycad, and many net-veined ferns of 
which some were doubtless seed-bearing, together with the forms of 
unknown fruit like Cissites, Vitiphyllum, and Liriodendropsis, all 
go to show that there is no special hiatus between the angiospermous 
foliage and the more primitive seed-bearing plants. A single new 
locality in the upper Triassic or lower Jurassic may at any time com- 
pletely close the foliage gap. Again, the stem structure of the ang: 
sperms presents no difficulty of derivation from the older types, 
which free branching is already known, as well as the presence of 
numerous flowers undergoing great reductions and changes. 
The great double funnels of the near-by Ipomoea, nearly a foot 
in length, show how readily fusions-have gone on, and how great 
must have been the changes, reactions, and alterations going on for 
ages in all floral organs. The balance once disturbed, or a critical 
stage or plastic form once accomplished, infinite changes in a truly 
polyphyletic race set in. ar 
Other fossil evidence for metamorphosis and reduction will be 
forthcoming, and speedily. But the student of fossils now realizes 
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