80 



PRACTICAL BOTANY. 



MULTIPLE (collective, CONFLTJENt) FEriTS. 



153. Multiple feuits result from the aggregation of a 

 mimber of flowers (an inflorescence) in one mass. The fruits 

 of Mitchella and of some Honeysuckles result from only 

 two flowers. Their ovaries are united into a double or 

 bwin berry. Here, then, we have the simplest form of 

 3ollective fruit. Collective fruits from a large number of 

 lowers are the Mulberry, the Pineapple, and Fig. They 

 ire transformations of dense forms of inflorescence, the 

 loral envelopes, coherent with each other, having become 

 3ompletely or in part succulent. In the Mulberry, which 

 it first view resembles a blackberry, the grains are the 

 ipened ovaries, not of a single flower, but of as many dis- 

 ;inct, clustered flowers ; and the pulp of the grains results 

 'rom the transformation of the floral envelopes, and not 

 )f the ovary-walls. This sort of fruit, thereiore, is not 

 mly confluent, but also anthocarpous. The fruit of 

 he Fig issues from an inflorescence, enclosed in a hollow 

 lower-stalk, which becomes pulpy. A collective fruit is 

 ilso the strobile, or cone — :a scaly, multiple fruit, which re- 



Cdt XV. 



