The Principles of Morphology. 131 
On this subject I am obliged to differ radically from the entire 
point of view assumed by Miss Sargant in her monograph of 
Monocotyledonous seedlings. 
In most Pteridophytes and in the Moss a single quadrant is 
employed in forming the cotyledon and capsule respectively; here 
again therefore we see the homology between these two organs. The 
primitive type is obviously the perfectly terminal capsule. And we 
may take the Monocotyledonous embryo with its terminal cotyledon 
as representing the primitive type in Angiosperms, and the subse¬ 
quent formation of the leafy stem from it will be an index to that 
of the leafy stem from the original sporogonium in the case of 
Cormophytes generally. Prom the hypocotyl of the Monocotyle¬ 
donous embryo arises a second shoot-member (“ Sprossglied”) 
quite comparable to the first, consisting of terminal leaf and basal 
stem-segment (“ Stengelglied ”) ; from this a third arises, and so 
on, until finally an apical growing point arises on the axis, which 
asserts itself precociously time after time, i.e. before the morpho- 
logicaliy-terminal leaf of each stage of the sympodium has had time 
to develope. The primitive sympodium with its perfectly terminal 
leaf at each successive stage thus becomes merged into the purely 
secondary monopodium in which a central main axis predominates, 
bearing the leaves in a lateral position. This monopodial con¬ 
struction, however, is a pure illusion, the phantamasgoria which has 
led away the majority of botanists on the most unwitting of 
wild-goose chases. The fact is we need to entirely amend our 
artificial conception of a leaf as a purely lateral appendage to an 
axis. We are misled all along the line into believing these 
secondary modifications to be the original types. Nothing, to my 
mind, is more natural and reasonable than the conception of our 
modern leafy stem having arisen out of the sympodial repetition of 
a number of sporogonial heads, each stem-segment being the 
homologue of a seta and each leaf that of a capsule. 1 
But 1 may here emphasize the belief that as in Riccia, the most 
primitive Liverwort, the entire embryo forms the capsule, it becomes 
highly probable that the next most primitive type is that of 
J ungermanniaceae and Ceratopteris, in which the epibasal half of 
the embryo gives rise to the capsule, while phylogenetically later 
1 The antagonists of this view have a favourite way of main¬ 
taining that no evidence is available in support of it; this is a 
complete mistake : the evidence is not only present, but to my 
own mind, clear and convincing, viz. that of embryological data, 
which have been given above at sufficient length for my 
purpose. 
