Caspary, in an elaborate paper on phyllomorphy occurring in Trifolium repens, figures foliaceous ovules springing from the edge of an open, leafy carpel. The nucleus of the ovule, in these cases, appears to originate as a little bud from the surface of the leafy ovule (figs. 141, 142).
Fig. 141.—Leafy ovules, &c., Trifolium repens.
In a species of Triumfetta ([see p. 260]), of which I examined dried specimens, the ovary was open and partly foliaceous; it bore on its infolded margins ten erect leaflets, representing so many ovules; each leaflet was conduplicate, the back being turned towards the placenta.
Fig. 142.—Leafy ovules of Trifolium repens, showing formation of nucleus, &c. After Caspary.
On the other hand, there are cases in which the leafy coat of the ovule, in place of being a distinct organ, seems to originate from the margin of the carpellary leaf itself—to be, as it were, a lobule or small process of the carpel, and not an absolutely new growth. Thus, Planchon[274], from an examination of some monstrous flowers of Drosera intermedia, was led to the inference that the ovules are analogous to hairs on the margins of the leaves. This acute botanist was enabled to trace all the gradations between the simple cup formed by the confluence of four glanduliferous hairs and the concave leaf and the perfect ovule.