1852.] PLANTS AND BOTANISTS. 



Hints to the beginner in Water Colour. 



79 



Plants and Botanists.' 



A Landscape is divided into three parts, distance, middle and 

 foreground, one-fourtli for light, one-fourth, for shadow, and half 

 for middle tint, or medium between hght and darkness. 



Azure distances require autumnal tinted foliage, between Sienna 

 and Gamboge. 



Trees most green at prominent parts, grey at top and sides. 



If a tree is requu-ed on a blue sky, let it be yellower than 

 otherwise. 



If dark fohage on yellow ground, bluer. 



The sky near the zenith blue, but paler as it neara the horizon. 



The general shade tint. Indigo and Indian red, the general 

 glazing yellow-ochi'e and lake. 



Vivid blues, reds, greens, and yellows used sparingly. 



Highest lights not profusely scattered over the picture. 



The princijsal object to be placed in the best possible view. 



The eftect is bad when the parts are many. 



Warm effect of colours, white, yellow, orange, red, purple and 

 black. 



Cold etfect of colours, black, dark blue, blue, green, yellow 

 pale yellow and white. 



In general warm colours must predominate ; red is medium 

 in a warm effect, green a medium between light and dark. 



Cold tints are made with blue and yellow, blue, and warm 

 tints -with yellow and red. 



Greys are warm as the}' contain orange, cold as they contain 

 pui'ple or green. 



Pure tones are those that approach purple, heavy as they near 

 to green. Avoid greenish blues and yellows; and green, between 

 blue and yellow that the}' produce. 



Red becomes more rich as it tends to blue — ^brilliant as it 

 advances to yellow. 



Purple and orange are pleasant in all their tints, but green 

 only as it becomes yellow. 



Indian red, indigo and yellow-ochre are the primitives for 

 mixing, the following being produced by their combinations : — 



Orange by Yellow and Red. 



Green " Yellow " Blue, 



Purple " Red " Blue, 



Brown " Orange " Purple, 



Ohve " Green " Orange, 



Slate " Gi-een " Purple, 



Black " Olive " Brown and Slate, 



White " Black diluted to the highest tint. 



Colours most vivid by contrast: 



Yellow when opposed by Purple, 



Red " " " Green, 



Blue " " " Orange, 



Dark Orange " " " Warm Green, 



Red Brown " " " Dark Green, 



Red Purple " " " Yellow Green, 



Dark Pm-ple " " " Warm Brown. 



The opposite of either primitive is made by the other two. 



The beginning of a creature, whether animal or vegetable, is 

 a mystery seemingly unfathomable. Nevertheless, continued 

 microscopic research is gradually revealing indications, dim yet 

 not uncertain, of the phenomena that are grouped around the 

 genesis of the germ. Every new fact brought to light thi'ough 

 the laborious perseverance of indefatigable observers, raises more 

 and more our astonishment at the mingled simj^lieity and com- 

 plexity of procreating nature. Within the last ten, or rather 

 within five years, great advances have been made in the study 

 of embryology. German botanists have especially chosen this 

 line of research, and their endeavours have been rewarded with 

 no small amount of success. The scientific naturalist, to whom 

 their writings, mostly in the form of scattered memoirs and short 

 papers may be inaccessible, will find an excellent digest of the 

 results arrived at in two very able reports by Mr. Henfrey, a 

 young English botanist, who is earning well-deserved laurels by 

 his zealous labour's in this difHcult department. It is not easy to 

 make clear to the genej'al reader the particulars of such incj^uiries, al- 

 though the conclusions which have been induced from them are 

 of remarkable interest. We shall endeavour, nevertheless, to 

 present, in plain and untechnical shape, one of these curious his- 

 tories, and teU the story of the beginning of a pine-tree, for the 

 benefit of lovers of Nature, whose time and tastes are so employ- 

 ed as to prevent their seeking jjersonally for these fiowei'-born 

 truths. 



Plants that have distinct and mimistakeable flowere produce 

 their eggs (ovules) either within a nurser3'-cradle (ovary or ger- 

 men,) constituted out of metamorphosed leaves, or unprotected 

 and exposed — foundling fashion. Among the latter are firs, 

 pines, cedars, junipers, yews, cypresses, and similar cone-bearing 

 trees ; these cones being whorls of scale-hke leaves arranged to 

 serve as screens to the little eggs that are the essence of the cone, 

 or else to the little anthere that originate the jsotent dust or 

 " pollen," which is destined to fertilize the eggs and convert them 

 into seeds. The grains of pollen-dust, though microscopic in 

 their dimensions, are by no means simple in their structure, for 

 their is, as it were, organ within organ, included within their 

 diminutive frames. Each consists of an outer coat and an 

 inner one, the latter endowed with a marvellous ability of gi-owth 

 and extension; elongating, when set free, its filmy membrane 

 into dehcate tubes that grow with magical quickness, and trans- 

 mit through their cavities the still minuter vivifying particles 

 that live within them. The poet sings a libel when he makes 

 his talking tree 



" La7igiddly adjust. 



It vapid vegetable loves 



With authers aud with dust." 



Not until the pollen grain has fallen upon the ovule (in anglo- 

 sjjermous plants upon the stigma or viscid disc that crowns the 

 ovary) does the embryo of the future plant begin in any way to 

 be manifested. The former event may be said invariably to pre- 

 cede the latter, the relation between them being one of cause 

 and effect. The anomalies, are obscure and exceedingly few, so 

 that they cannot be accepted as objections to this rule. So fai- 

 we are repeating what every youth, acquainted with the rudi- 

 ments of botanj', knows. This knowledge was the_starting point 

 for those who woidd investigate the mystery. 



The &gg of the pine is an assemblage of minute cells forming 

 a kernel enveloped in a single cellular coat. Deep in its sub- 

 stance is a row of cells that combine to make a special sac or 

 ca\-ity. When the grains of pollen have fallen upon the egg 

 they burst, and their inner linings protrude in the shape of tubes, 

 and penetrate its substance. Soon after, the sac that lies within 

 it becomes filled up with new-born cells. A year rolls away in 



* Weslrainsler Review — October. 



