io8 



ORGANS 



OF 



Sect. VII. 2. 2. 



flowers are feparate from the femak, and the anthers are feen in fair 



weath 



burft 



force, and to difcharee their duft, which h 



bout the plant like a cloud 







IS 



In plants of the clafs dioecia, or two houfes, the fecundating farina 

 carried to the diftance of many miles by the winds, as has been 

 proved by the impregnation of fome female date trees, which were at 

 a great diftance from the male ones. And the male flowers thera- 

 felves of vallifneria are carried many miles down the rivers, which it 

 inhabits, to the femal 

 of the Rhone; 



J ones. This plant has its ro^ts at the bottom 

 the flowers of the female plant float on the furface of 



the water, and are furniflied with an elaftic fpiral ftalk, which 



ds 



as 



rifes and falls. The flowers of th 



male plant are produced under water, and as foon as their farina, or 

 duft, is mature, they detach themfelves from the plant, and rife to 

 the furface, continue to flourifh, and are wafted by the air, or borne 

 by the currents, to the female flowers. In this refembling thofe 

 tribes of infers, where the males at certain feafons acquire wings, but 

 not the females, as ants, coccus, lampyris, phalscna, brumata, licha- 

 nella. See vallifneria in the^Families of Plants, tranflated from Lin- 

 neus. Johnfon, London. 



The plants, which grow in the air, are frequently injured in wet 

 feafons by the molfture occafioning the cells of the anthers, which 

 contain the fecundating farina, to burfl:, and to (bed it on the g-round. 



To which a fcarcity of the quantity of wheat, or an imperfedlion of 

 its fecundating quality, and the ufl:ilago, or fmut, have rationally been 

 afcribed, as its anthers are expofed on long filaments to the weather* 

 On this account many flowers clofc their corols before rain, and the 

 aquatic plants of rivers perform their impregnations in the air. But 

 M. Bonnet remarks another method of the difperfidn of the fecun- 

 dating influence of fome marine plants, in which the male organ does 

 not projedl a fine powder, but a liquor, which forms a perceptible 



w 



cloud in the water; and adds, that the male falamander darts his 



5 



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