EARLY GROWTH. 37 
ripened after the fall of the summer flower which 
bore it, sleeps like the plants themselves. The 
wintry rains supply one condition of growth, but 
the frosty temperature is uncongenial to germi- 
nation. It is only when the influence of spring 
—the season of gentle warmth and genial showers 
—is exercised upon the plant germ, that it enters 
upon its career of development. It is many days 
before we see the gentle uprising of the budding 
plant: for in the darkness of its subterranean 
resting-place the seed has given full employment 
to the mysterious forces of Nature; and there 
has been much to do in order to commence the 
release of the enfolded embryo, to burst its in- 
teguments, and to bring the ascending portion 
of its axis—the plumule—to air and sunlight, 
to kindly dews and softly moistening rain, at the 
surface of the ground. 
But almost simultaneously with—though gene- 
rally before—the upward growth of the plumule, 
the radicle has commenced a downward course, 
passing through the micropyle, and beginning the 
strain upon the integuments, which, taken in 
conjunction with the continuous expansion of the 
