216 Mr Jolm Scott on the Sexual Changes 



lets, staminal and pistillary organs are similarly aborted. 

 Again, in the arrangement of the male and female florets 

 in the secondary axes, a similar plan is observed to that of 

 the primary axis ; the female florets occnpying their basal 

 portions, but in several instances perfectly developed, the 

 upper portions being covered with perfect male spikelets. 



Secondly, In specimen No. 3, — a terminal panicle, — we 

 have a very irregular intermixture of perfect and imperfect 

 male and female florets, along with several structurally her- 

 maphrodite florets. Generally speaking, however, in this 

 specimen, as in No. 2, the upper portions of both primary and 

 secondary axes still retain their normal-male-sexual charac- 

 teristics, and the basal portions assuming the female charac- 

 ters. By a careful examination, however, I have detected 

 several structural peculiarities in certain florets of the latter 

 part, to which I am inclined to attribute a highly important 

 theoretical signification, as will be seen subsequently. The 

 following are the most instructive : — First, In the superior 

 floret of a spikelet, presenting the broad glumes and palese of 

 the female florets, I found a rudimentary hypogynous stamen ; 

 while in the inferior floret the glumes were ovately-ld.Ticeo~ 

 late, squamulai as usual in normal male florets, stamens 

 developed, but destitute oi pollen. Second spikelet ; glumes 

 of siperior floret 6roac%-lanceolate, squamul^ cuneate, ob- 

 liquely truncate, larger than those characteristic of the male 

 florets, ovary and style incipient, as in the above; but in 

 this case I found tiuo rudimentary stamens, one consisting 

 of the filament alone, the other of the filament and a pel- 

 lucid rudimentary anther, presenting the appearance of a 

 glandular hair ; the only modification the inferior floret of 

 this spikelet had undergone from its normal male condition, 

 was the non-development of the pollen, the anther-cases 

 being quite empty. Third spikelet ; glumes of superior floret 

 o2;a^e^2/"^anceolate, squamulee cuneate, minute, anthers des- 

 titute of pollen ; inferior floret functionally a perfect male, 

 glumes 6roa(i^^-lanceolate, squamulee as usual in male 

 florets, anthers containing pollen. 



These, then, are the more interesting peculiarities which 

 T have observed in the structure of the florets in the above 

 panicle ; and there is just one other point in connection 



