Page:An introduction to physiological and systematical botany (1st edition).djvu/297

 Rh least is the mode in which Linnæus and his followers understand the four last-mentioned flowers; but we have already hinted that Jussieu is of a different opinion, and he even calls the decided Nectary of Epimedium an internal petal! Difficulties attend both theories. It seems paradoxical to call petals those singular bodies in Aconitum, like a pair of little birds, which are manifestly formed only to hold the honey, and not situated nor constructed so as to perform the proper functions of petals; but on the other hand Ranunculus, t. 100, 515 and 516, one of the same natural order, has evident calyx and petals, which latter have a honey-bearing pore in their claw, evincing their identity with the less petal-like Nectaries just described. Other instances indeed of Nectaries in the claws of petals are found in the Crown Imperial and Lily; which only confirms more strongly the compendious construction of the Lily tribe, the leaves of their flowers in these examples being Calyx, Petals and Nectaries all in one.

The most indubitable of all Nectaries, as actually secreting honey, are those of a