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monadelphous ; each floret consisting of a single stamen, or of a few united, collected, in a 
deciduous amentum, about a common rachis ; anthers 2-lobed or many-lobed, bursting 
outwardly ; often terminated by a crest, which is an unconverted portion of the scale out 
of which each stamen is formed ; pollen large, usually compound. Females in cones. 
Ovary spread open, and having the appearance of a flat scale destitute of style or stigma, 
and arising from the axil of a membranous bract. Ovule naked ; in pairs on the face of the 
ovary, having an inverted position, and consisting of 1 or 2 membranes open at the apex, 
and of a nucleus. Fruit consisting of a cone formed of the scale-shaped ovaries, become 
enlarged and indurated, and occasionally of the bracts also, which are sometimes oblite- 
rated, and sometimes extend beyond the scales in the form of a lobed appendage. Seed 
with a hard crustaceous integument. Embryo in the midst of fleshy oily albumen, with 2 
or many opposite cotyledons ; the radicle next the apex of the seed, and having an organic 
connexion with the albumen. — Trees or shrubs, with a branched trunk abounding in resin. 
Wood with the ligneous tissue marked with circular disks. Leaves linear, acerose or lan- 
ceolate, entire at the margins ; sometimes fascicled in consequence of the non-development 
of the branch to which they belong ; when fascicled, the primordial leaf to which they are 
then axillary is membranous, and enwraps them like a sheath. 
Affinities. With the exception of Orchidacese, there is perhaps no na- 
tural order the structure of which has been so long and so universally misun- 
derstood as Coniferse. This has arisen from the exceedingly anomalous na- 
ture of their organisation, and from the investigations of botanists not having 
been conducted with that attention to logical precision which is now found 
to be absolutely indispensable. The description above given is that which I 
conceive proper to explain the views now taken upon the subject, in conse- 
quence of the discovery by Brown of the ovules of the whole order being na- 
ked ; and it will probably be found to offer a more intelligible account of the 
fructification than is to be met with in even the most recent systematic works. 
It is not expedient to enter here upon an inquiry into the ideas that botanists 
have successively entertained upon this subject. Those who are desirous of 
informing themselves upon this point wiU find all they can desire in the Ap- 
pendix to Captain King’s Voyage to New Holland, and in Richard’s M^moires 
sur les Conifer es et les Cycadees. It may, however, be useful to advert briefly 
to the principal theories which have met with advocates. These are, firstly, 
that the female flowers consist of a bilocular ovary having a style in the form 
of an external scale, an opinion held by Jussieu, Smith, and Lambert ; se- 
condly, that they have a minute cohering perianth, and an external additional 
envelope called the cupule : this view was taken by Schubert, Mirbel, and others ; 
thirdly, that they have a monosepalous calyx cohering more or less with the 
ovary, contracted and often tubular at the apex, with a lobed, or glandular, or 
minute entire limb, an erect ovary, a single pendulous ovule, no style, and a 
minute sessile stigma : this explanation is that of Richard, published in his 
memoir upon the subject in 1826. It appears, however, from the observations 
of Brown, that the female organ of Coniferse is a naked ovule, the integuments 
of which have been mistaken for floral envelopes, and the apex of whose nu- 
cleus has been considered a stigma. Of the accuracy of this view there is pro- 
bably, at this time, little difihrence in opinion. These female organs, or naked 
ovules, are 2 in number, and they originate from the larger scales of the cone 
towards their base, have an inverted position, and occupy the same relative 
place in Coniferse and in Zamia, a genus of Cycadacese. Now, as there can- 
not be any doubt of the perfect analogy that exists between the scales of the 
cone of Zamia and the fruit-bearing leaves of Cycas, the former differing from 
the latter only in each being reduced to 2 ovules, and to an undivided state ; 
so there can be no doubt of the equally exact analogy between the scales of 
Coniferse and Zamia, and therefore the former would be called reduced leaves 
if the general character of the tribe was to produce a highly developed foliage ; 
but as the foliage of Coniferse is in a much more contracted state than the 
scales of their cones, the latter must be understood to be the leaves of Coni- 
