228 
SUMMARY OF CURRENT RESEARCHES RELATING TO 
be great variations, and may be perfect ; while, conversely, variations 
which are large do often produce symmetrical results. Again, the per- 
fection or completeness in which a variation in symmetry occurs is not, 
or at least need not be, proportional to the frequency of the occurrence 
of the variation. A large number of the variations which occur in nature 
— especially the occurrence of peloria, or regular flowers in species 
normally irregular — are abrupt or discontinuous ; these are apparently not 
reversions to an ancestral type, and can afford no assistance in tracing 
the evolution of the species. 
Pseudanthy of the Flowers of Camellia and Geum.* — According to 
Sig. U. Bernaroli and Prof. F. Delpino, an examination of the origin 
and course of the vascular bundles in the flower of Camellia shows that 
the androecium is composed of five androphores (phalanges or male 
inflorescences) springing from the axils of the petals, and not from the 
axils of the sepals as in the Malvaceae, Hypericaceae, and Rosacere ; in 
addition to these are two or three lateral androphores, apparently of 
independent origin. At an early period each of the five androphores 
divides tangentially into two branches, which again divide polytomously, 
and not dichotomously as in the Euphorbiacere, Malvaceae, and Hyperi- 
cacere. The two or three supplementary androphores are probably the 
axillary product of corresponding abortive petals. The flowers of 
Camellia are therefore pseudanthic, though the pseudanthy is developed 
in a different way from that of the Malvaceae. The same conclusion is 
derived from the examination of abnormal flowers. 
In the greater number of the Rosaceae an examination of the origin 
and course of the vascular bundles in the flowers is attended with great 
difBculties, owing to the confined space in which the vascular network 
of the receptacle branches ; but Geum urbannm and its allies present 
more favourable subjects. Here, also, the androecium is composed of five 
male monopodial polytomous inflorescences, not dichotomous as in the 
Malvacere, each of which springs from the axis of a sepal. Each petal 
has a double origin, representing the union of two bracts, one belong- 
ing to the male inflorescence on the right, the other to the male in- 
florescence on the left. In Geum every sepal is three-nerved ; and the 
leaves of the outer calyx are evidently also double organs resulting from 
the fusion of the left stipule of the right-hand sepal with the right stipule 
of the left-hand sepal ; and the so-called median nerve is not in reality 
a median, but a sutural nerve. 
Flower of Iochroma.f — Prof. G. von Lagerheim describes the 
peculiar structure of the flower of Iochroma macrocalyx (Solaiacrre) 
from Ecuador. The space between the calyx and the corolla is filled 
with a quantity of clear water, which serves to prevent the drying 
up of the buds, and also to protect the honey from the too vigorous 
assaults of the humming birds which feed upon it. The fluid appears 
to be secreted from glandular hairs on the inside of the calyx. 
“Sling-fruit” of Cryptotaenia. } — Mr. E. J. Hill describes the 
mechanism by which the mericarps or half- fruits of Cryptotaenia cana- 
* Malpighia, v. (1891) pp 145-55 (1 pi.). Cf. this Journal, 1891, p. 213. 
t Ber. Deutsch. Bot. Gesell., ix. (1891) pp. 348-51 (9 figs.). 
J Bot. Gazette, xvi. (1891) pp. 299-302. 
