88 Dr. Wight on the Separation of the Pomegranate 



" The fruit of the pomegranate is described by Gaertner and De 

 Candolle as being divided into two unequal divisions by a horizontal 

 diaphragm, the upper half of which consists of from five to nine 

 cells, and the lower of three ; the cells of both being separated by 

 membranous dissepiments ; the placenta of the upper half proceed- 

 ing from the back to the centre, and of the lower irregularly from 

 their bottom : and by Mr. Don as a fleshy receptacle formed by the 

 tube of the calyx into a unilocular berry, filled with a spongy placenta, 

 which is hollowed out into a number of irregular cells. In fact, if 

 a pomegranate is examined, it will be found to agree more or less 

 perfectly with both these descriptions. But it is clear that a fruit 

 as thus described is at variance with all the known laws upon which 

 compound fruits are formed. Nothing, however, is more common 

 than that the primitive construction of fruits is obscured by the ad- 

 ditions, or suppressions, or alterations, which its parts undergo du- 

 ring their progress to maturity. Hence it is always desirable to ob- 

 tain a clear idea of the structure of the ovarium of all fruits which 

 do not obviously agree with the ordinary laws of carpological com- 

 position. Now a section of the ovarium of the pomegranate in va- 

 rious directions, if made about the time of the expansion of the flow- 

 ers before impregnation takes place, shows that it is in fact com- 

 posed of two rows of carpella, of which three or four surround the 

 axis, and are placed in the bottom of the tube of the calyx, and a 

 number, varying from five to ten, surround these, and adhere to the 

 upper part of the tube of the calyx. The placentae of these carpella 

 contract an irregular kind of adhesion with the back and front of 

 their cells, and thus give the position ultimately acquired by the 

 seeds that anomalous appearance which it assumes in the ripe fruit. 

 If this view of the structure of the pomegranate be correct, its pecu- 

 liarity consists in this, that, in an order the carpella of which oc- 

 cupy but a single row around the axis, it possesses carpella in two 

 rows, the one placed above the other, in consequence of the contrac- 

 tion of the tube of the calyx, from which they arise. Now there 

 are many instances of a similar anomaly among genera of the same 

 order, and they exist even among species of the same genus. Ex- 

 amples of the latter are, Nicotiana multivalvis and Nolana paradoxa, 

 and of the former, Malope among Malcacece ; polycarpous Ranuncu- 

 lacece as compared with Nigella, and polycarpous Rosacea as compared 

 with SpircEa. In Prunus I have seen a monstrous flower producing 

 a number of carpella around the central one, and also, in conse- 

 quence of the situation, upon the calyx above it ; and finally, in the 

 ' Revue Encyclopedique' (43. 762), a permanent variety of the apple 

 is described, which is exactly to Pomea what Punica is to Myrtacece. 

 This plant has regularly fourteen styles and fourteen cells, arranged 

 in two horizontal parallel planes, namely, five in the middle and nine 

 on the outside, smaller and nearer the top ; a circumstance which is 

 evidently to be explained by the presence of an outer series of car- 

 pella, and not upon the extravagant hypothesis of M. Tillette de 

 Clermont, who fancies that it is due to the cohesion of three flowers." 

 — Lindley (/. c). 



