Dunal and Campdera have described flowers of _Rumex crispus_, with seven
pistils, occupying the place of as many stamens.

[Illustration: FIG. 162.--Substitution of carpels for stamens in
_Papaver_.]

In _Papaver bracteatum_ a considerable number of the stamens sometimes
become developed into pistils, especially those which are nearest to
the centre of the flower, and in these flowers the filaments are said to
become the ovaries, while the anthers are curled so as to resemble
stigmas. A similar change is not infrequent _Papaver somniferum_.
Goeppert, who found numerous instances of the kind in a field near
Breslau, says the peculiarity was reproduced by seed for two years in
succession.[339] Wigand ('Flora,' 1856, p. 717) has noticed among other
changes the pistil of _Gentiana Amarella_ bearing two sessile anthers.
_Polemonium caeruleum_ is another plant very subject to this change.
Brongniart[340] describes a flower of this species in which the stamens
were represented by a circle of carpels united to each other so as to
form a sheath around the central ovary. By artificial fertilization M.
Brongniart obtained fertile seeds from the central normal ovary as well
as from the surrounding metamorphosed stamens.

_Cheiranthus Cheiri_ has long been known as one of the plants most
subject to this anomaly. De Candolle even mentions it in his 'Prodromus'
as a distinct variety, under the name of _gynantherus_. Brongniart (loc.
cit.) thus refers to the _Cheiranthus_:--"Sometimes these six carpellary
leaves are perfectly free, and in this case they spread open, presenting
two rows of ovules along their inner edges, or these edges maybe
soldered together, forming a kind of follicle like that of the
columbine; at other times, these staminal pistils are fused into two
lateral bundles of three in each bundle, or into a single cylinder which
encircles the true pistil. In a third set of cases these outer carpels
are only four in number, two lateral and two antero-posterior, all fused
in such a manner as to form around the normal pistil a prism-shaped
sheath, with four sides presenting four parietal placentae, corresponding
to the lines of junction of the staminal carpels."

In the accompanying figures (fig. 163, _a-d_) the nature of this change
is illustrated. In some of the specimens it is easy to see that the two
shorter stamens undergo the change into carpels later and less perfectly
than the four longer ones, and not infrequent