Page:An introduction to physiological and systematical botany (1st edition).djvu/159

 Rh scales become leafy, and render the Scapus a proper Caulis.

The Stalk is spiral in ''Cyclamen, Engl. Bot. t. 548, and Valisneria spiralis'', a wonderful plant, whose history will be detailed hereafter.

Linnæus believed that a plant could not be increased by its Scapus, which in general is correct, but we have already recorded an exception, p. 112, in Lachenalia tricolor. The same great author has observed that "a Scapus is only a species of Pedunculus." The term might therefore be spared, were it not found very commodious in constructing neat specific definitions of plants. If abolished, Pedunculus radicalis, a radical flower-stalk, should be substituted in its room.

4., the Flower-stalk, springs from the stem, and bears the flowers and fruit, not the leaves. Pedicellus, a partial flower-stalk, is the ultimate subdivision of a general one, as in the Cowslip, and ''Saxifraga umbrosa, Engl. Bot. t.'' 663.