490 MR. M. T. MASTERS ON AXILLARY PROLIFICATION IN FLOWERS. 



two adventitious buds. It may be here stated that there are usually (always ?) two such, 

 buds, and two only, in this family. I have been disappointed in not having been able to 

 discover anything in the cruciferous flowers I have examined that throws light ujion 

 the morphology of the hypogynous glands, so common in this family. Either these 

 bodies have been unchanged in the prolified flowers, or they have been entirely absent. 



The order Caryophyllacece is very liable to these malformations. This has been before 

 alluded to, in speaking of the elongation of the thalamus, and the displacement of the 

 members of the floral whorl. 



Since the publication of my paj)er on median prolification, I have been informed of the 

 presence of that malformation in the flowers of a Geranium — a genus of an order in which 

 such an occurrence was to have been expected, from the nature of the thalamus. 



Prolification among the JJmhelUferce is interesting, from the fact that frequently the 

 calyx is completely detached from the pistil, and is separated into its constituent leaves ; 

 at other times the structure of the calyx is less extensively interfered with. The pistil is 

 frequently present in the guise of two disunited lance-shaped leaves. The most remarkable 

 instance that has fallen under my notice is a specimen of Daiicus Carota, gathered by myself 

 in Switzerland in July 1858 (PI. LIV. fig. 4). In this specimen the calyx was tubular, 

 its limb divided into five small teeth. The carpels were leaf-like, disjoined, and unpro- 

 vided with ovules ; between them rose a central prolongation of the axis, which almost 

 immediately divided into two branches, each terminated by a small umbel of perfect 

 flowers, surrounded by minute bracts. The petals and stamens were little changed ; but 

 the calyx and the leafy carpels demand a more explicit descrij)tion. The lower part of 

 the carpellary leaves was inseparably united to the interior of the calyx-tvibe. This 

 latter organ was traversed by ten ribs, apparently corresponding to the primary ridges 

 of the normal fruit ; these ribs were destitute of spines, and the bristly secondary ridges 

 were entirely absent. Those portions of the carpels which were detached from the calyx 

 had each three ribs, a central and two lateral ones, which appeared to be continuous with 

 the ribs of the calyx below, — although in the case of the calyx there were ten, in the case 

 of the carpels six ribs, three to each. This diversity in number is thus explained : — A 

 circle of vascular tissue ran round the interior of the calyx-tube, at its junction with the 

 limb, and at the point of insertion of the petals and stamens. This vascular circle seemed 

 to be formed from the confluence of the ten ribs from below. Of the five ribs in each 

 half of the calyx, the three central ones were joined together just at the point of con- 

 fluence with the vascular circle, above which they formed but a single ril) — that traversing 

 the centre of the carpellary leaf; the two lateral ribs of each half of the calyx seemed to 

 be continuous, above the vascular rim, with the lateral ribs of the carpel ; these lateral 

 ribs were connected on either side with the central one by short branches of communica- 

 tion. The disposition of the ten ribs may be thus represented : — 



111 111 

 32323 32323 

 11111 11111 



The lower line of figures represents the calycine ribs, the middle row shows how each of 

 these ribs is divided at the vascular rim, and the uppermost row shows their distribution 



