INTRODUCTION 
Prunece of the Family Rosacece, including Plums, Cherries, Almonds, etc., is 
succulent, indehiscent, and generally one-seeded. It is made up of three 
layers — the epicarp or skin, the mesocarp or flesh, and the endocarp or stone, 
the seed being the kernel. Polycarpellary fruits will be either apocarpous 
or syncarpous. The former are all termed etcerios (Greek eralpo?, hetairos, a 
companion). The separate carpels [fruitlets or carpids) of an eta?rio may 
be either dry and one-seeded ( achenes , from the Greek a, a, not ; ^aiVa>, 
cliaino , I split), as in the Buttercups, Strawberry, Cinquefoils, and Roses; 
or dry and many-seeded, splitting down their inner surfaces ( follicles ), 
as in the Marsh Marigold and the Columbine ; or succulent, like a 
miniature drupe [drupels), with epicarp, mesocarp, endocarp, and kernel, 
as in Blackberry and Raspberry. These are called respectively etierio of 
achenes, etaerio of follicles, and etaerio of drupels. 
Syncarpous dry fruits include the cypse/a , the nut, the samara, the 
schizocarp , the siliqua, and the capsule. The cypsela (Greek Kvipe\rj, kupsele , a 
chest) is the small, dry, indehiscent, inferior, one-seeded fruit of the Composite , 
which is often, but not always, surmounted by a crown of hairs or pappus, 
as in the Dandelion and Thistles. The nut, characteristic of many catkin- 
bearing trees, such as Hazel, Beech, Oak, and Hornbeam, differs mainly in 
being generally larger and having a thicker often woody exterior. The 
name samara is applied generally to winged fruits, whether indehiscent, 
with a single wing, as in the Ash, or surrounded by a double wing, as in 
the Elms and Birches, or partially dehiscent into two or more carpels each 
with a distinct wing, as in the Maples. These wings serve to catch in the 
wind sufficiently to carry the fruit and its contained seed away from the 
shadow of the parent tree. Schizocarps include dry fruits splitting into two 
one-seeded carpels, as in the Umbelliferce, among which the so-called 
“ caraway-seed ” is a familiar example of such a carpel ; others splitting 
into three or more carpels, as in the Spurges, Mallows, and Cranes-bills ; and 
others again in which two carpels divide into four one-seeded “ nutlets,” 
which, therefore, each represent a half-carpel, as in Mints, Borage, 
Hounds-tongue, etc. The siliqua is the flattened, two-chambered, many- 
seeded, pod-like fruit of the Family Cruciferce, in which the two carpels 
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