CHAP. II. 
FRUIT. 
231 
3. Nux, externally hard. 
4. Nucula, externally hard, small, and one-seeded. 
5. Drupa^ externally soft, internally hard. 
6. Pomum, fleshy or succulent, and large. 
7. Bacca, fleshy or succulent, and small. 
8. Dacca sicca, fleshy when unripe, dry when ripe, and 
then distinguishable from the capsule by not being brown. 
9. Lequmen, 1 , . ^ • i i 
10 Siliqua J pericarps oi certain natural orders. 
11. Amphispermium, a pericarpium which is of the same 
figure as the seed it contains. 
In more recent times there have been three principal 
attempts at classing and naming the different modifications of 
fruit ; namely, those of Richard, Mirbel, and Desvaux. These 
writers have all distinguished a considerable number of varia- 
tions, of which it is important to be aware for some purposes, 
although their nomenclature is not much employed in practice. 
But, in proportion as the utility of a classification of fruit 
consists in its theoretical explanation of structure rather than 
in a strict applicability to practice, it becomes important that 
it should be founded upon characters which are connected with 
internal and physiological distinctions rather than with external 
and arbitrary forms. Viewing the subject thus, it is not to 
be concealed, that, notwithstanding the undoubted experience 
and talent of the writers just mentioned, their carpological 
systems are essentially defective. Besides this, each of the 
three writers has felt himself justified in contriving a nomen- 
clature at variance with that of his predecessors, for reasons 
which it is difficult to comprehend. 
If a complete carpological nomenclature is to be established, 
it ought to be carried farther than has yet been done, and to 
depend upon principles of a more strictly theoretical character. 
I have accordingly ventured to propose a new arrangement, 
in which an attempt has been made to adjust the synonymes 
of carpological writers, and in which the names that seem to 
be most legitimate are retained in every case, their definitions 
only being altered ; previously to which I shall briefly explain 
the methods of Richard, Mirbel, and Desvaux. 
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