Upon cutting one of these into two parts, the surface appears at Fig. 37. On the outer part all round the internal substance appears radiated outward, being of a dark red and brown colour, and in its center inclosing a white substance, which in many places shoots itself out into the brown substance in little radii towards the cortex.
Juniperus.
Fig. 38, 39. J. Communis. Linn. Juniper Berry. Fig. 38, a, is a juniper berry magnified to shew its marks the more plainly. This fruit is quite round, of a black colour, which, although it appears smooth, yet the covering appears porous, and resembles the surface of shagreen in some measure. At the top it has a triangular sulcus, which is not very deep, and in some it is superficial. At the other extremity the stem appears, which is rough near the place of its insertion, with a scaly covering for a little space. b, is a transverse section of a juniper berry, which shews the thickness of the pulpy substance of the fruit, which appears every where interspersed and mixed with a great quantity of fine yellow gum, that in many places is in lumps, especially about the ossicula or stones of the fruit. This parenchyma incloses three of these ossicula, lying in close contact together by their flatter sides, and with their apices meeting at the top. c, is the fruit of its natural size, some grains may be a little bigger, some a little less.
Fig. 39 is the convex side of one of the stones, having from the apex three or four ridges, which render it triangular at the top, and are lost towards the basis, of an irregular form, long, narrow, and shining, after being cleansed of the pulp that covers them with the gummy matter just mentioned; but when dry, has an appearance like that of the stones of other fruit. Fig. 40 shews a longitudinal section of one of them, which brings to view a nucleus in all respects like that of a plumb-stone, being cloathed with a membrane, and having a succulent parenchyma. a, is the stone in its natural size.
Santonicum.
Fig. 41, 42. Artemisia S. Linn. Worm-seed. Fig. 41 shews the form of a middling seed enlarged by the microscope, for they are of different sizes among one another. This is one of the most singular in its structure, having scarce any thing substantial in it. The four little figures near it are those of a natural size, which are very small, and therefore renders the examination of them the more difficult. The seed has a small end or handle, being the place to which the stem which supports it was fixed, and the other end is bulky and round, having from the hoary handles several bulges all round, which are soft, and so very tender, that the rubbing of the seeds together reduces the surfaces to powder, whereby a large seed may be reduced to a very small one. The seed seems to be entirely composed of thin brittle membranes of an extreme delicate contexture, as at Fig. 42, having a dark center, from which it is transparent outward to the edge all round, and radiated upwards by infinitely fine radii, which do not render it in the least opake. Thus from the very outer surface the seed is composed of these sort of membranes, one after another, till nothing remains behind. Their colour before the naked eye is of a yellowish cast, but before the microscope for opake objects shines in many places like gold.
Scabiosa Major Vulgaris.
Fig. 43 to 46. S. Arvensis. Linn. Scabious. There is no seed perhaps which has more beauties than this of the scabious. Fig. 43 is a view of what botanists call one of the florets, which is a calix to the seed, whose fibres appear to extend themselves over its edges. This cup is of an octagonal form, and makes an appearance like a fine vase, having scallopped edges, and towards the inner part of the edge a whitish ruffled membrane. The ribs run down from its mouth, which is bell-fashioned, and becoming narrower downward, form obtuse angles, by continuing from the bend to form the bottom of the vase. Between these ribs down the bend the vase is clear, though not quite transparent, and from thence to the bottom the ribs are hairy, and make an agreeable figure.
Fig. 44 is the seed taken out of the vase, and drawn in another proportion, wherein appears first its thick body, which is somewhat hoary by the microscope, and runs up with a narrow neck, till it divides into five spiculated fibres, called by Gerard purple thrumbs, whose spiculæ or spines are determined upwards, and are thereby ready to cause the seed to recede from any thing that might injure it upon being touched. The bodies of the vases when first ripe are of a fine lemon yellow, but grow by long keeping darker; and the bason formed by the roots of the fine fibres is of a fine green, but the fibres themselves of a shining brown, like brown sugar-candy, as their spines are also.
Fig. 45 represents the stalk to which the vases stick by their bottoms, all which, when together, form the head mentioned by botanists to be the characters of some species of the scabious. In this figure the body of the stalk appears all stuck full of narrow whitish leaves, and the round spots between their roots are the vestiges of the bottoms of the vases; so that the leaves and vases are mixed together all over the stalk.