Love: A Treatise on the Science of Sex-attraction: for the use of Physicians and Students of Medical JurisprudenceTalmey, Bernard Simon
Science
Love: A Treatise on the Science of Sex-attraction: for the use of Physicians and Students of Medical Jurisprudence
Talmey, Bernard Simon
Sex
Complete and perfect flowers are hermaphroditic. The male organ or the
androcele and the female organ or the gynocele are situated in one and
the same flower. The unisexual flowers are those where the stamens
and the pistils are produced on separate flowers, as in the willow.
Stamen and pistil may not only be produced on separate flowers, but the
staminate and pistillate flowers themselves may be borne on different
plants, as in hickory, hazel, or Indian corn. Such plants are called
dioecious or of two households. When both kinds of flowers appear on
the same individual, the plant is called monoecious or of one household.
[Illustration: CUT XXXVII.
_Stamen._
a, anther; f, filament. After Bergen.]
[Illustration: CUT XXXVIII.
_Pollen grains._
s, spots where the inner coat bursts. After Bergen.]
The stamen, or the male sexual organ of the flower, consists of a
hollow portion called the anther, which is borne on a stalk called the
filament. Inside of the anther is found a powdery or pasty substance
called the pollen. The shape of the anther and the way in which it
opens depend largely upon the way in which the pollen is to be
discharged and how it is carried from flower to flower. As a rule, the
anther opens by the cells being split length-wise, or by little holes
at the top.
The pollen in many plants is a fine dry powder, in others it is
somewhat sticky or pasty. The forms of the pollen grains are various.
Each pollen-grain consists of a single cell and is covered by a thick
outer and a thin inner wall or coat. At the outer coat there are spots
at which the inner coat of the grain is finally to burst through the
outer one, pushing its way out in the form of a slender thin-walled
tube. The contents of the pollen is a thickish protoplasma, full of
little opake particles, and usually containing grains of starch and
little drops of oil.
[Illustration: CUT XXXIX.
_Pistil._
sti, stigma; sty, style; ov, ovule. After Bergen.]
The pistil, or the female sexual organ of the flower, usually consists
of a small hollow chamber called the ovary, which contains the ovules,
and of a slender portion or stalk, called the style. At the top of the
latter is found a ridge, knob, or point which is called the stigma.
The stigma consists of cells loosely arranged over the surface. These
cells secrete a moist substance, to which the pollen grains adhere
when they come in contact with the stigma. Beneath these superficial
cells, running down through the style, there are found long cells, with
intermediate spaces, through which the pollen tube reaches the ovary.
[Illustration: CUT XL.
_Stigma of thorn-apple with pollen._
p, pollen forming into a pollen-tube; i, intermediate space. After
Bergen.]
The ovules are not borne indiscriminately by any part of the lining of
the ovary. They grow in a line running along one side of the ovary,
as may be seen in the pea pod. This ovule-bearing line is called the
placenta.
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