Fabaceae

“ It is the part that, if allowed to grow, would push [133] down into the earth, send out branches there, and become the root. At the point marked g is a compact bunch of tiny leaves, all white, forming a kind of bud, but one that is much feebler and more delicate than buds that grow on branches. It is called a gemmule. This bud will unfold and send forth the first leaves. Finally, the narrow line of demarcation between the radicle and the gemmule is called the tigella, and from it the trunk of the tree will take its start. Such is the almond-tree in its seed. ”

“ The tap-root of the young tree pushes downward until it reaches this barrier, where it is straightway forced to stop growing in depth and compelled to send out lateral branches.
“The kind of root we have thus far been talking about is primordial, original; every plant has it on emerging from the seed; it appears as soon as the seed germinates. But many plants have other roots that develop at different points of the stem, replacing the original root when that dies, or at least coming to its aid if it continues to live. ”

“ The slightest peculiarity which, for unknown reasons, appears in a plant grown from the seed, and which sometimes is found only on a single branch, as the indented outline of the leaves or the variegation of the blossoms, is reproduced with minute accuracy if the graft, slip, or layer is taken from the branch having this modification. By this means horticulture is daily enriching itself with double flowers or a new shade, or with fruit remarkable for its size, its early or late ripening, its juicy flesh, its more pronounced aroma. ”

“ In these the axis remains short, nearly as it is in the bud; the leaves therefore remain close together in sets or circles; the outer ones, those of the calyx, generally partake more or less of the character of foliage; the next set are more delicate, and form the corolla, while the rest, the stamens and pistils, appear under forms very different from those of ordinary leaves, and are concerned in the production of seed. This view gives to Botany an interest which one who merely notices the shape and counts the parts of blossoms, without understanding their plan, has no conception of. ”

“ No seed germinates without the help of moisture. Water plays a multiple part. First it soaks into the germ and the parts surrounding it, causing these to swell more than the envelope, so that the latter, however hard a shell it may be, is burst open. Through the cracks of this broken envelope the gemmule pushes out on one side and the radicle on the other, and henceforth the little plant enjoys the benefit of sun and air. Germination is more or less slow according to the degree of resistance offered by the walls of the seed. ”

“ V. Genus; VI. Species.
To illustrate: The white pine belongs to the highest great division (sub-kingdom) of the plant kingdom. The plants of this division all produce seeds, and hence are called “spermaphytes” (“seed plants”) . They may be divided into two groups (classes) , distinguished by certain peculiarities in the flowers and seeds. These are named respectively “gymnosperms” and “angiosperms,” and to the first our plant belongs. The gymnosperms may be further divided into several subordinate groups (orders) , one of which, the conifers, or cone-bearing evergreens, includes our plant. ”

“ When it has leaves and roots that are sufficiently developed, the little almond-tree will nourish itself by drawing what it needs from the earth and air. But until then it must live, it must grow stronger, and it must increase a little in size. As nothing can come from nothing, the germinating seed must find somewhere the material for its first growth. This cannot be in the soil so long as the radicle is nothing but a point, incapable of any work; neither can it be in the air so long as the little leaf-bud has not unfolded and developed into foliage. ”

“ The flowering plants have several distinct and visible organs for the formation and fertilization of their seed, to each of which is assigned a special and necessary office. In the flowerless section, on the contrary, there are none of these visibly separate agencies in reproduction, and what are usually termed the seeds do not show any parts representative of the developed product. In the true seeds, which belong to flowering plants alone, are contained the rudiments of a stem, leaves, and root, but in the spores of the flowerless plants nothing of the kind is found. ”

“ In garden flowers, also, we see most striking results of continuous selection. By taking advantage of the tendency of stamens and carpels to change occasionally into petals, and of petals to increase in number, “double flowers” have been effected. When “doubling” is complete—that is, when the conversion into petals is thorough—no seed can of course be produced, and the plants must be propagated by cuttings. Different other slight natural variations, exaggerated by selection and cultivation, have been the source of innumerable “varieties” in our gardens. ”

“ I have ascertained that there is no specimen in Munby’s1587 herbarium, now at Kew. As the Arabs grow the bean on a large scale, it may perhaps be met with accidentally outside cultivated plots. It must not be forgotten, however, that Pliny (lib. xviii. c. 12) speaks of a wild bean in Mauritania, but he adds that it is hard and cannot be cooked, which throws doubt upon the species. Botanists who have written upon Egypt and Cyrenaïca, especially the more recent,1588 give the bean as cultivated.
This plant alone constitutes the genus Faba. ”

“ The essentials of flowers are stamens and pistils, giving rise to seeds, and the essential of a seed is an embryo (8) . Cryptogamous or Flowerless plants are propagated by Spores; and a spore is not an embryo-plantlet, but mostly a single plant-cell (399) .
483. Vascular Cryptogams, which compose the higher orders of this series of plants, have stems and (usually) leaves, constructed upon the general plan of ordinary plants; that is, they have wood (wood-cells and vessels, 408) in the stem and leaves, in the latter as a frame work of veins. ”

“ He begins by distinguishing Herbs, Shrubs, and Trees. Proceeding to the detailed classification of Herbs, he divides them into Imperfect "which either do want or seem to want some of the more essential parts of Plants, viz. either Root, Stalk, or Seed," the Cryptogamia of Linnaeus; and Perfect "having all the essential parts belonging to a Plant." The Perfect Herbs are arranged in three main groups according to (1) their leaves, (2) their flowers, (3) their seed-vessel, each group being subdivided in various ways. ”

“ It is formed very early in the growth of the root, stem, and leaves,—traces of it appearing in large embryos even while yet in the seed. Those cells that lengthen, and at the same time thicken their walls form the proper Woody Fibre or Wood-cells; those of larger size and thinner walls, which are thickened only in certain parts so as to have peculiar markings, and which often are seen to be made up of a row of cylindrical cells, with the partitions between absorbed or broken away, are called Ducts, or sometimes Vessels. ”

“ Thus Poales include Poaceæ and Cyperaceæ. Rosales include Rosaceæ and several families.
In other words, individual plants are grouped in species, species into genera, genera into families, and families into orders. These orders are themselves grouped into still larger divisions; there are, for instance, twelve orders comprising all the monocotyledons, and about twenty orders comprising all the dicotyledons. Once we have decided that any plant is a monocotyledon or a dicotyledon, our next step should be as to which order it belongs, then its family, its genus, and finally its species. ”

“ There is no mistake about it; a plant has left its remains there; we behold in very truth the leaf with its subdivisions and its veins. It is all there, even to the minutest detail. It is really the leaf minus the green color, for which is substituted the black of the coal. We should not obtain a more exact representation if we ourselves took the imprint of some sufficiently firm leaf on a soft plaque of clay. ”

“ Pod with evanescent partitions, and a thick axis bearing several anatropous seeds, 5-valved, the valves coiling elastically and projecting the seeds in bursting. Embryo straight; albumen none.—Leaves simple, alternate, without stipules, in our species ovate or oval, coarsely toothed, petioled. Flowers axillary or panicled, often of two sorts, viz.,—the larger ones, which seldom ripen seeds;—and very small ones, which are fertilized early in the bud; their floral envelopes never expand, but are forced off by the growing pod and carried upward on its apex. ”

“ Thus the pear, through repeated plantings of the seed, would become increasingly sour, small, and hard, until it had at last returned to the sorry state of the wild pear growing on the edge of the woods. But this defect attending growth from the seed is redeemed by one very desirable quality: the tree thus grown regains more or less the robustness of its wild type; it is incomparably more vigorous, healthier, longer-lived, than the artificially perfected tree whose strength is compromised by the very excess of its fructification. One has vigor, the other fine fruit. ”

“ The Megachiles1 build their honey-jars with disks cut out of leaves; certain Anthidia make felted cotton wallets; others fashion pots out of resin. There you have instinct. Will any rash mind ever conceive the singular idea that the Leaf-cutter might very well have started working in cotton, that the cotton-wool-worker once thought or will one day think of cutting disks out of the leaves of the lilac- or the rose-tree, that the resin-kneader began with clay? Who would dare to indulge in such theories? Each Bee has her art, her medium, to which she strictly confines herself. ”

“ As are the fruit, flowers, foliage of this parent stock which has furnished the buds or slips for transplanting, so will be the fruit, flowers, foliage of the resulting plant or tree. Nothing will be added to the qualities we wish to perpetuate, but on the other hand nothing will be subtracted. To the double flowers of the original from which came the [166] layer, the slip, or the graft, will correspond the double flowers of the plant developing from this layer, slip, or graft: the same shade of coloring will be reproduced, and the fruit will have the same size, savor, and sweetness. ”

“ As a general rule, the growth of the root keeps pace with that of the stem or trunk. Thus the oak, elm, maple, beech, and all our large trees have a vigorous, deep-growing root as anchorage for the enormous superstructure, to brace it firmly against the wind. But there is no lack of lowly herbage that has roots quite out of proportion to the other parts,—veritable tap-roots of greater size and vigor than many a plant of far greater aërial development can boast. ”

“ The direction of the seeds is possible in five ways, either upright and horizontal, transverse, or rising obliquely upwards and downwards in relation to the axis of the ovary.
1312. Every perfect seed (of Dicotyledons) is none other than a pentifoliar, involuted, pinnate leaf. The shell of the seed is the leaf-spathe or phyllodium, the two seed-lobes are the two posterior pinnate leaflets,249 while the germinal leaflets, or plumula, are the two anterior pinnate leaflets, together with the odd leaflet. ”

“ Many flowers have no corolla, but they always have at least a calyx, which in its simplest form is reduced to a tiny leaflet shaped like a scale. Flowers with no corolla remain unnoticed, and the plants that bear them seem to us to have no blossoms. It is a mistake: all trees and plants bloom, even the oak, willow, poplar, pine, beech, wheat, and multitudes of others whose blossoming is unheeded by the inattentive eye. Their flowers are extremely numerous, but as they are very small and have no bright-colored corolla they escape any but the closest scrutiny. ”

“ When it is intended that the stem or branch shall itself maintain the buds it bears, then, instead of coming out into the open air where it would speedily cover itself with foliage and flowers, it remains underground and has for leaves only rudimentary scales. It grows so corpulent and deformed as to cease to bear the name of branch and to take instead that of tuber. As soon as necessary supplies have been stored up, the tuber detaches itself from the mother plant, and thenceforth the buds it bears find in it abundant nourishment for their separate existence. ”

“ Accordingly the tree lives first for itself, accomplishing this object by covering itself with buds that develop into branches covered with leaves. It is indeed on the leaves that the fundamental principles of the plant’s life are based; it is in their substance that, with the sun’s help, the descending sap is elaborated, this sap being the nutritive fluid, the life-blood as it were, of the vegetable organism. The propagation of the species comes next in importance. This duty devolves on the flower-buds or those that blossom and produce fruit, in the center of which are the seeds. ”

“ Very few of the genera of plants, or even of the families, can be pronounced with certainty to be Kinds. The great distinctions of Vascular and Cellular, Dicotyledonous or Exogenous and Monocotyledonous or Endogenous plants, are perhaps differences of kind; the lines of demarcation which divide those classes seem (though even on this I would not pronounce positively) to go through the whole nature of the plants. But the different species of a genus, or genera of a family, usually have in common only a limited number of characters. ”