Fossil plants, Vol. 3 : $b A text-book for students of botany and geologySeward, A. C. (Albert Charles)
Science
Fossil plants, Vol. 3 : $b A text-book for students of botany and geology
Seward, A. C. (Albert Charles)
Paleobotany
from one another by ⅔ of the circumference, alternate in position with
the lower portions of leaf-traces in the perimedullary region of the
same stem. The phyllotaxis is thus seen to be ⅖.
[Illustration: Fig. 403. _Lyginopteris oldhamia._ _a–e_, foliar
bundles; _f_, decurrent base of petiole; _r_, _r′_, roots; _s_, seed
(_Lagenostoma_). (× 3. Kidston Coll. 592, B.)]
The secondary wood is succeeded by a cambium of normal structure
passing gradually into a narrow band of secondary phloem which in
well-preserved stems is seen to consist of sieve-tubes and parenchyma
with medullary rays rather broader than those in the xylem. Beyond the
phloem is the comparatively broad pericycle consisting of parenchyma
with nests of sclerenchyma like those in the pith and scattered
secretory cells. In the outer layers of the pericycle a phellogen
was formed at an early stage in the growth of the plant, producing
several layers of secondary tissue, which is regarded as periderm and
forms a conspicuous feature in _Lyginopteris_ stems; it appears as a
comparatively dark sinuous band where it bends outwards to wrap round
the leaf-traces in their almost vertical course through the pericyclic
region (fig. 403). The periderm is clearly seen at _p_ close to the
crushed secondary phloem of the dividing leaf-trace in fig. 404, D. All
the leaf-traces seen in fig. 403 beyond the secondary wood are still
within the deep-seated periderm and, as Williamson and Scott showed,
each leaf-trace after emerging from the secondary wood remains in the
pericycle-zone for a length of five internodes as it very gradually
inclines outwards. Once free from this region the twin bundles bend
more sharply towards the petiole. Stated briefly, the history of
each leaf-trace from the perimedullary region to the leaf-base is as
follows: at the outer edge of the pith a single trace consists of a
mesarch xylem bundle with one protoxylem strand; it passes vertically
through five internodes and then bends out through a foliar gap in
the xylem-cylinder, and the primary tracheids receive additions from
the cambium of the stele on their outer face. As the trace leaves the
secondary xylem it bends upwards and, as seen at _d_, fig. 403, begins
to divide into twin bundles. As the trace passes higher the bisection
of the protoxylem and metaxylem is completed and the secondary
xylem-arcs are gradually lost until the separate strands of each pair
are reduced to single mesarch bundles composed wholly of primary
tracheids. As the trace bends outwards through the cortex the phloem
gradually encircles each xylem-strand until a concentric structure is
substituted for the collateral disposition of the conducting tissue.
At the same time the protoxylem strands divide and occupy a position
near the inner edge of the metaxylem. On reaching the petiole or after
passing some distance up the axis of the frond, the twin bundles unite
and usually form a V-shaped vascular strand (figs. 404, E; 405, A).
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