10 
SCIENCE OF GARDENING. 
The foramen is the little orifice which is visible in some seeds, and to it the 
future radicle is directed. The nucleus encloses the embryo which, when impregnated, 
becomes the vital point — the future plant, surrounded by integuments that, in the 
ripe seed, consist, as the case may be, of gluten, albumen, and starch. During the 
process of maturation, the ovule is attached to the ovary or seed-vessel, by a substance 
called the placenta ; a cellular mass, which connects the vitalized embryo with the 
fluids of the plant. 
We are not inquiring into the botanical structure of seeds (impregnated 
ovules), or of seed-vessels (pericarps) ; our object is to ascertain, so far as the 
intricacy of the subject may permit, the simple phenomena of germination and 
vegetation. 
Yet in order to fix in the mind a definite object, we will presume the case of a 
Pelargonium, crossed by another plant of the same genus, for the purpose of obtain- 
ing a variety. Gardeners know well, that although the curled stigma of the one be 
dusted over its five revolutions with farina, one only of its seeds usually swells and 
becomes fertile ; thus offering conclusive evidence that a single ovule or seminal 
rudiment has been excited by the fertilizing tube, or essence of the farina. 
It has been a question with physiologists, by which of the two parents the 
offspring is most influenced : we lean to the opinion that, as the unimpregnated 
ovule and its nucleus will inevitably dwindle and collapse ; and as by contact with 
the pollen the embryo becomes vitalized, its nucleus organized, and its fluids 
converted into solid appendages, " the aura" or whatever else the subtile agent may 
be that effects impregnation, must be the parent ; and as such, the rudimental image 
of the future variety ; which, however, as it is fed by the fluids of the female, becomes 
more or less modified according to existing circumstances. 
Of the phenomena of germination , we perceive the most open and ready solution . 
in the processes of malting. Barley is, by analysis, found to consist of — 
Gluten 3 parts 
Sugar . 4 „ \" % 
Gum . . . . 5 „ 
Starch 88 „ 
100 
Gluten is an azotised substance, and its elements appear to be — 
Carbon . ' . . . 55.7 
Hydrogen . . . . . 7.8 
Oxygen 22.9 
Azote 14.6 
100 
Now, it is asserted that "a seed" contains a greater proportion of carbon than 
enters into any other of the vegetable products. If this be true, grains and seeds 
owe their excess of carbon to the gluten which they contain. And again ; if it be 
required as a condition of growth, that the excess of carbon be removed and 
