OP THE EMBRYOS IN THE SEEDS OF CONIFERS. 575 



not altogether improbable on considering tbe analogous 

 ceconomy in several tribes of insects, in some of which the 

 male fluid remains inactive in the female for a still longer 

 period ;^ and in plants, though for a much shorter period, I 

 may refer to Goodenovim, in which the pollen is applied to 

 the stigma a considerable time before that organ is suffi- 

 ciently developed to act upon or transmit its influence.^ 

 But the supposed protracted state of inactivity in the pollen 

 of Pinus does not necessarily lead to the adoption of Dr. \sh 

 Schleiden's theory. With respect to Cycadece, whatever 

 opinion may be adopted as to the precise mode of action of 

 the pollen in that family, it is certain that the mere enlarge- 

 ment of the fruit, the consolidation of albumen, and the 

 complete formation of the corpuscula in its apex are wholly 

 independent of male influence, as I have proved in cases 

 where pollen could not have been applied, namely, in plants 

 both of Cycas and Zamia {Encephalartos) producing female 

 flowers in England at a time when male flowers were not 

 known to exist in the country. 



EXPLAKATION OF PLATE 33 (VII). 



Fig. 1. A scale of the cone of Pinus sylvestris, with its winged seeds, one of 

 which is abortive : natural size. 



N.B. The remaining figures are more or less magnified. 



Fig. 2. An unripe seed, of which the testa, in this state cartilaginous, is cut 

 open, partly removed and thrown back to show the included body, which is the 

 half-ripe original nucleus with its sphacelated apex and the free portion of the 

 inner coat, extending from the apex to about one third of the length of the 

 nucleus, below which it is intimately connected with and inseparable from the 



outer coat. , i .j i 



Fig. 3. The amnios or albumen, with the coats opened and laid back. _ 

 a.°The body of the albumen, with its slightly concave upper extremity: in 

 this stage separated from b, the apex, which is conical above, below cylin- 

 drical, and which was suspended from the top of the original nucleus. 



1 Herold. Bntwickel. der Schraetterl. &c. 1815, et Siebold in Miiller's 

 Archiv, 1837, p- 392. , . ^ , ^^^ ^ _. „„ -, 

 3 Append, to Flinders's Austral, p. 501. yAnte^p. 66. \ 



