n STRUCTURE OF FLOWERS IN CLASS XVII. 



Seeds — A few, roundish, smooth, fleshy, pendulous, marked 

 with an embryo that is a little prominent towards the point 

 of insertion. When the ova* are hatched, the cotyledons-]- pre- 

 serve the form of the halved seed. 



Receptacle — The proper receptacles of the seeds are very 

 small, very short, thinner towards the base, obtuse at the disk 

 that fastens them, oblong, inserted longitudinally in the upper 

 suture of the legumen only, but placed alternate ; so that when 

 the valvular have been parted, the seeds adhere alternately to 

 each of the valves. 



The ordinary situation of the flowers is obliquely pendulous ; 

 that is, at an acute angle from the perpendicular. The orders 

 are four, containing seventy -eight genera, viz. 



Order 1. Pentandria, comprehending such plants as have Jive 

 stamina. Of this order there is only one genus, viz. Monnieria. 



Order 2. Hexandria, comprehending such plants as have six 

 stamina. This order contains tiuo genera, viz. Fumaria (fume- 

 ioiy)., .and Saraca. 



Order 3. Octandria, comprehending such plants as have eight 

 stamina. This order contains three genera, viz. Polygala (milk- 

 ?ior?)...SEcuRiDACA...and Bredemeyeha. 



" Order 4. Decandria, comprehending such plants as have ten 

 stamina. This order contains fifty genera, distinguished into, 

 h Such us have ?no?iadelphousi filaments ; of which there are twen- 



* Eggs, meaning the seeds themselves, which answer to the eggs of animals, and 

 are as it were hatched when the corculum, or first principle of the new plant begins 

 to strike root and vegetate. See Part I. Chap. VII. Author. 



f Side leaves of the seed. See Part I. Chap. VII. The two seed-leaves, which 

 first appear above ground, are these very cotyledons, which are brought up with the 

 plant, after the corculum has struck; aud it is these seed-leaves that are here spokeu 

 of. Author. 



t Owe set, or brotherhood. Author. 



M 'tVt 



