Page:The Journal of Indian Botany, Volume III.djvu/385

302 THE JOUENAL OF THE INDIAN BOTANICAL SOCIETY Similar experiments on Cucurbitaceae with simple (unbranched) tendrils lead the author to conclude that for such types as Momordica and Bryonia the tendrils consist of a tendril-stalk and a terminal leaf which develops into a tendril. In Cucmnis on the other hand the simple tendril is made up of a modified leaf only.

The history of development of the tendrils offers an explanation of this apparent contradiction. Tendrils are produced from a leaf with an axillary shoot. From this axillary shoot, (on which the leaf is borne as the first and, in unbranched tendrils, the only arm), is developed the tendril-stalk and, if not entirely used up in the process, further tendril-arms. In Cucumis this axillary shoot is not laid down, which leads to the absence of the tendril-stalk even in the adult stage.

The author’s conclusions though arrived at by other methods c-j 3 in agreement with those of Neitsch and we can* therefore, regard thi as a solution to this much debated problem of plant morphology.

S.P.A.