IIOUTICULTI KAL SOCIKTY OK LON'DO.V. 



37 



This proved to be an instance of one of those monstrous for- 

 mations sometimes found in plants, when the parts of the flower 

 resume more or less the state of leaves, and which thus explain 

 the laws upon which flowers are constructed. It appears from the 

 observations of liotanists that a flower is a bud, the scales or 

 rudimentary leaves of which are arranged in circles within each 

 other, and changed in form, colour, and even structure according 

 to the offices they have to perform in their altered condition. 

 For this reason, however different the calyx, the corolla, the 

 stamens, or the carpels of a flower may be from leaves, they are 

 each or all liable to revert to the form of ordinary leaves if any 

 accidental circumstance occurs to interfere with their develope- 

 ment as floral organs. In such instances the centre of the flower 

 will often extend itself into a branch clothed with leaves, just as 

 a leaf bud does, and the parts whose destination has been altered 

 from that of floral organs to leaves will, like ordinary leaves, pro- 

 duce other buds in their axils. 



In tlie case of Mr. Williams's plant the 5 sepals were un- 

 changed, the 5 petals were converted into dull greenish purple 

 serrated simple leaves, the 10 stamens remained unaltered, and 

 the centre, which had been intended for a pistil composed of 5 

 carpels, was lengthened into a short branch bearing a circle of 5 

 ovate, dull brownish red, toothletted, hairy, glandular leaves. 



The following cut represents the appearance of one of these 

 flowers when magnified. 



(«, the sepals ; b, the altered petals ; c, the stamens ; d, the lengthened 

 centre, surmounted by the 5 carpels changed to leaves.) 



In a subsequent communication, Mr. Williams stated that upon 

 re-examining the plant from which the flowers just described had 

 been taken, he found an instance where a kind of pentapetaloid 

 flower took the situation which the fruit would have found 

 had the structure been of tlie usual kind. In the centre of this 



