» ON THE PROTEACE/E OF JUSSIEU.
half the size it attains immediately before expansion, be carefully examined, it will be found that the polleniferous sacs, as they are termed by Jacquin and his followers, in which they suppose the antherae to be merely immersed, are really the organs by which the fcecundating matter is secreted : for at this period they are perfectly closed, and consequently all communication cut off between the stigma and their contents now consisting of a turbid fluid or pulpy mass. If the stigma be at the same time observed, the gland-like bodies which originate in its grooved angles are already visible ; but, instead of having the cartilaginous or homy texture which they at length acquire, are as yet semi- fluid, and of hardly a determinate form. Near the base of each side of these grooves a more superficial depression is observable, which, though in some cases extremely short, is in others of considerable length, and generally forms a right angle with the corresponding groove. In these de- pressions, the processes by which, at a more advanced stage, the contents of the antherse are connected with the stigma, are immersed, and at this period they are found to be semi- fluid. By degrees the glands, as well as their lateral pro- cesses, acquire a firmer consistence, and the inferior or outer extremity of each of the processes, being extended beyond 19] its depression or furrow, on the bursting of the opposite cell of the corresponding anthera, firmly attaches itself to its contents, now become a regular mass of a waxy con- sistence.
If the accuracy of this statement be admitted, it will probably be allowed that the Asclepiadece cannot be re- garded as gynandrous, especially in the sense in which they are so considered by botanists ; but lest it should not be thought completely satisfactory, it may be added, that in a still earlier stage of the flower bud I have found the fcecundating matter already secreted in the cells of the anthera?, while the glands of the stigma, as well as their processes, were absolutely invisible.
As to the question of their being pentandrous or decan- drous, every analogy must lead us to refer them to the former class ; nor, indeed, have they, when not considered
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