94 -Seeds of Plants as Projectiles. [February 
seeds, attached by short funiculi to a common parietal placenta. 
The seeds of the inner rows being attached to the top, while the 
outer ones are attached to the sides of the raised keel, give to the 
boat-shaped valves an appearance of overloading, and are heaped 
up in the middle, and were it not for their slender funiculi would 
be spilled out by the least motion. The shooting process is now 
begun by the hard smooth edges and sides of the valves pressing 
on the outer rows of seeds below their greatest diameter; the 
pressure being transmitted to the under side of the seeds of the 
heaped up middle rows, they generally are the first projected. 
Usually but one seed is projected at a time, and the short 
funiculi permitting another one to take the vacant space, the 
inner rows are kept full until but a single row remains. But the 
movement does not stop here; it is continued, and the pressure 
reinforced by the outer, and sometimes the inner end of the valve 
coming into close contact and clasping the seed on three sides, 
until all are forced out, one by one, and the sides of the valve are 
left in contact. During the process of drying, which still con- 
tinues in the now empty and useless valve, the sides are separated 
and it again assumes the former carinate shape. Any one seeing 
the dry and empty pods would scarcely think of their having 
gone through the changes we have described. And as the move- 
ments that project the seeds take place while the valves of the 
capsule are yet in a semi-green state we conclude they form an 
important part in the life history of the plant. The pods of the 
inconspicuous flowers of V. striata, are grown in the axils of the 
leafy stem, on long peduncles, and have the same movements of _ 
straightening and erection as in V. cucullata. The pods of View _ 
canadensis are sessile, ae i 
The projecting movement may be roughly compared to the 
unlading of a boat by slowly crushing the sides together. 
The shooting process may be conveniently watched by gath- 
ering the mature pods after they have opened, and plunging the 
stem into a cup of sand; however, treated thus the valves after 
once closing will not again re-open. The lateness in the season 
at which my observations began, prenepied my seeing the pods 
_ following the conspicuous flowers. a 
In giving the generic characters of Pilea in his Sinise of a 
Botany, Prof. Gray says, “Fertile flowers. Sepals three, oblong, 
a more or less unequal ; a rudiment of a stamen before aes in the i 
