STRUCTURAL BOTANY. 93 



nite inflorescence, either simple or compound, in whicli 

 the order of flowering is centrifngal, beginning at the 

 centre or top of the cluster. This sort of inflorescence 

 occurs in the Elder, Arrow-wood, Dogwood, etc. Very 

 curious forms of cyme are seen in the Borrage family, 

 and are often, for convenience' sake, described as racemes 

 or spikes. 



The fascicle is a cyme with the flowers much crowded 

 — that is, a compact, bundle-like flower-cluster, in which 

 the order of flowering is centrifugal, as in Dianthus. 



The glomerule is an axillary, condensed cluster of flow- 

 ers, exhibiting a centrifugal evolution. When occurring 

 in the axils of opposite leaves, so as to meet around the 

 stem, they constitute a verticilaster, or verticil, as in Mar- 

 rubium and Nepeta cataria. 



178. The order of flowering is in ^11 forms of definite 

 inflorescence, centrifugal or descending, which is the same 

 thing. In Buttercups it is obviously descending, the 

 upper flowers expanding first, the lowest last. In the 

 Elder it proceeds from the centre toward the circum- 

 ference of the cluster, or flies the centre. If we imagine 

 the flowering axis of a Buttercup to be contracted, the 

 lower, younger flowers will become the outer, and the 

 upper, older ones, the inner. 



ITO. We conclude the chapter on inflorescence by 

 briefly recapitulating the principal differences between its 

 two modes. 



The indejmiU mode of inflorescence is that in which 

 the primary or leading axes elongate indefinitely, or 

 merely cease to grow from lacking nourishment ; the deji- 

 nite is that in which the primary or leading axes are ar- 

 rested in their growth by solitary flowers at their ex- 

 tremity, or checked definitely. 



