Aspects of nature, in different lands and different climates (Vol. 2 of 2): with scientific elucidations — John Shaqi
Aspects of nature, in different lands and different climates (Vol. 2 of 2): with scientific elucidationsHumboldt, Alexander von
Science
Aspects of nature, in different lands and different climates (Vol. 2 of 2): with scientific elucidations
Humboldt, Alexander von
Physical geography; Plant morphology; Science; South America -- Description and travel
[4] p. 5.--“_Winged insects._”
Formerly the fertilization of flowers in which the sexes are separated
was ascribed principally to the action of the wind: it has been
shown by Kölreuter, and with great ingenuity by Sprengel, that bees,
wasps, and a host of smaller winged insects, are the chief agents.
I say the chief agents, because to assert that no fertilization is
possible without the intervention of these little animals appears to
me not to be in conformity with nature, as indeed has been shown in
detail by Willdenow. (Grundriss der Kräuterkunde, 4te Aufl., Berl.
1805, S. 405-412.) On the other hand, Dichogamy, coloured spots or
marks indicating honey-vessels (maculæ indicantes), and fertilization
by insects, are, in much the greater number of cases, inseparably
associated. (Compare Auguste de St. Hilaire, Leçons de Botanique, 1840,
p. 565-571.)
The statement which has been often repeated since Spallanzani, that the
diœcious common hemp (Cannabis sativa) yields perfect seeds without
the neighbourhood of pollen-bearing vessels, has been refuted by later
experiments. When seeds have been obtained, anthers in a rudimentary
state, capable of furnishing some grains of fertilizing dust, have
been discovered near the ovarium. Such hermaphroditism is frequent
in the entire family of Urticeæ, but a peculiar and still unexplained
phenomenon has been presented in the forcing-houses at Kew by a small
New Holland shrub, the Cœlebogyne of Smith. This phænogamous plant
produces in England perfect seeds without trace of male organs, or the
hybridising introduction of the pollen of other species. An ingenious
botanist, Adrien de Jussieu, in his “Cours Elementaire de Botanique,”
1840, p. 463, expresses himself on the subject as follows:--“Un genre
d’Euphorbiacées (?) assez nouvellement décrit mais cultivé depuis
plusieurs années dans les serres d’Angleterre, le Cœlebogyne, y a
plusieurs fois fructifié, et ses graines étaient évidemment parfaites,
puisque non seulement on y a observé un embryon bien constitué, mais
qu’en le semant cet embryon s’est développé en une plante semblable.
Or les fleurs sont dioïques; on ne connait et ne possède pas (en
Angleterre) de pieds mâles, et les recherches les plus minutieuses,
faites par les meilleurs observateurs, n’ont pu jusqu’ici faire
découvrir la moindre trace d’anthères ou seulement de pollen. L’embryon
ne venait donc pas de ce pollen, qui manque entièrement: il a dû se
former de toute pièce dans l’ovule.”
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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