378 Extracts from Lindley^s Vegetable Kingdom, 



work above quoted. All I can do is to give in a note the substance 

 of his descriptions of Salvinia and Azolla.* 



* " Salvinia verticillata. — Male organ 2 articulated hairs on the stalks of 

 the ovula ; each joint containing a nucleus and a brownish fluid ; ovula nearly 

 sessile, concealed by the roots, and partly covered with hairs ; tegument open 

 at the top ; mature reproductive organs solitary, or in racemes of 3-5, about 

 the size of a pea, covered with brown rigid hairs, the upper ones of each 

 raceme (or lowest as regards general situation) contain innumerable spherical 

 bodies of a brownish colour, and reticulated cellular surface, terminating 

 capillary simple filaments, These again contain a solid whitish opaque body. 

 The other which occupies the lowest part of the raceme, and which is the 

 first and often the only one developed, is more oblong, containing 6-18 larger, 

 obiong-ovate bodies, on short stout compound stalks : colour brown, surface 

 also reticulated. Each contains a large embossed, opaque, ovate, fin body, of 

 a chalky aspect ; it is 3-lobed at the apex, and contains below this a cavity 

 lined by a yellowish membrane, filled with granular and viscid matter and 

 oily globules. 



" Azolla pinnata. — The growing points present a number of minute confer- 

 void filaments, the assumed male organs, which at certain periods may be 

 seen passing into the foramen, the ovula becoming resolved into their com- 

 ponent cells within the cavity of that body ; organs of reproduction in pairs 

 attached to the stem and branches, one above the other, concealed in a 

 membranous involucrum ; ovula atropous, oblong-ovate, with a conspicuous 

 foramen and nucleus, around the base of which are cellular protuberances ; 

 capsules of each pair either difform, in which case the lowest one is oblong- 

 ovate, the upper globose, or both of either kind, generally perhaps the globose, 

 presenting at the apex the brown remains of the foramen, and still enclosed 

 in the involucrum ; upper half generally tinged with red ; the oblong-ovate 

 capsule opens by circumcision ; with the apex separate, the contents which 

 consist of a large yellow sac contained in a fine membrane, the remains of the 

 nucleus (or the secondary capsule). The sac is filled with oleaginous granular 

 fluid, and surmounted by a mass of fibrous tissue, by which it adheres slightly 

 to the calyptra ; on the surface of the fibrous tissue are 9-cellular lobes (the 

 three upper the largest), which when pulled away, separate with some of the 

 fibrous tissue, and so appear provided with radicles. The globose capsule 

 has a rugose surface from the pressure of the secondary capsules within ; 

 these are many in number, spherical, attached by long capilliform pedicels 

 to a central much branched receptacle ; each contains two or three cellular 

 masses, presenting on their contiguous faces two or three radiciform pro- 

 longations. In their substance may be seen imbedded numerous yellow 

 grains, the spores." 



