ATTIRE, in botany, is used to denote the third part or division of the flower of a plant; the other two being the Empalement and the Foliation. See FLOWER. See also EMPALEMENT. This Attire is of two kinds; Semini-form, and Florid. The Semini-form Attire consists of two parts; Chives, or the Stamina; and Summets, or Apices; one upon each attire. See STAMINA and APICES. The Florid Attire is usually called Thrums, as in the flowers of marigold, tansy, etc.—These Thrums are called Suits, which consist of two, but most times of three pieces.—The outer part of the suit is the Floret, whose body is divided at the top, like a cowslip flower, into five parts or distinct leaves. See THRUM, etc. Attire, in hunting, the head or horns of a deer. See HEAD. The Attire of a stag, if perfect, consists of bur, pearls, beam, gutters, antler, sur-antler, royal, sur-royal, and croches.—Of a buck, the bur, beam, brow-antler, black-antler, advancer, palm, and spellers. See the article HUNTING.
APICES, in Botany, little Knobs growing on the Tops of the Stamina, in the middle of Flowers. See STAMINA and FLOWER. They are commonly of a dark, purplish Colour.—By the Microscope they have been discovered to be, as it were, a sort of Capsulae seminales, or Seed-Vessels, containing in them small globular, and often oval Particles of various Colours, and exquisitely formed; called the Farina Foecundans. See FARINA FOECUNDANS. What the Uses of these are, is not entirely agreed: Some have guessed them to be a kind of male Sperm which falling down into the Flower, fecundates and ripens the Seed. See further under the Article GENERATION OF PLANTS. The Word is Latin; being the Nominative plural of Apex, the Top or Summit of anything.
ALABASTRA, in Botany, are those little green Leaves which compass in the bottom of the Flower. See CALYX, &c.