^ ON THE INTERIOR BUDS OF ALL PLANTS. 



be protruded ? b}' all the different parts meeting' in a ba'-'dg 



when a collection of each matter is selected to produ e ^he 



circle of the leaf budb, and form a new leaf. F<w o:»era- 



tions can be more plain and easily understood than this part 



of the process ; it is attended with an odd kind of ron« 



trivance, which shows that nature often makes u^te of the 



Tormation of same means we do to effect the same purpose. When ihe 



the bud in ^ j^ ^.^ ^^^ selected to form the leaf bud, the rest is tied 



graiiu » _ 



with a knot, lest it should tear down or unravel (see oo tig, 



5). Then the vecstl selected rises, and soon products a 

 bud, and when the whole row is comitleted they join toge- 

 ther and form a new leaf uider the other : this is repeated 

 three times, but at the fourth knot, when the leat is produced, 

 it is formed round instead of fiat, and a cjuaiitity of albumen 

 is generated by the stopping of the sap. The line of life 

 then strikes out of the edge of the leaf", and forms a broad 

 circle in the interior of the band, which is always a fore- 

 runner of the bud ; immediately knots appear on the line, 

 they break, and the flower buds are seen shooting from the 

 ends; their numbers soon fill the round leaf: the buds are 

 all tied together by the line of life as in seeds, and remain 

 in their enclosure till they are perfectly ready to shoot out 

 T/se of th«* at the top of the plant in a spike of grassy flowers. Thus 

 Jtiiot ill grain (}^jg band or rallying point not only serves to strenghthen 

 the plant and support it, but gives a new way of forming 

 the leaf buds, and of protruding the flower buds ; and this 

 is no work of imagination, as 1 shall now show. Fig. 5 is the 

 part selected to form a new leaf bud. Fig. 6 is the first 

 shooting of the flower bud ; and though there is some little 

 part of the mechanism] do not quite understand, still as far as 

 I have described, what with watching and dissection, 1 am 

 pretty certain of being right, and not misleading those who 

 will venture to follow rue. That the flower bud is merely 

 the embryo of the plant, enclosed by a few seminal leaves, 

 and is not covered by the meal till the flower rises as high 

 as P, is a certain truth, since I have dissected them both 

 before and after. That the flour of corn, or meal, is 

 formed of the inner bark juices alone, I have the most po- 

 sitive proof; since it is onl) in the inner bark vessels it is to 

 be found, even from the root: at each new baud it growg 



more 



