STIPULES, in botany, are organs con nected with the leaves, existing only in the dico tyledonous plants. They are small scale-like or leafy appendages at the point where the leaves come off from the stem, and are commonly in pairs. there being one on each side of the petiole, as in the hornbeam and lime. They are more frequently free, not being attached to the petiole; but sometimes they are united to the base of that organ, as in the genus Rosa. The stipules afford excellent characters for the ar rangement of plants. When a vegetable of a natural order has these organs, it is very seldom the case that all the others are not equally pro vided with them. Thus they exist in all plants of the natural orders Leguminosce, Rosarea and Titiocea. As they fall off very easily when they are free, their absence might sometimes induce one to suppose a plant destitute of them, but this error may be avoided by observing that they always leave on the stem, at the place where attached, a small cicatrix, which attests the fact of their having existed. They vary greatly in
their nature and consistence. They may be foliaceous or leaf-like, as in the common agri mony; membranous, as in the fig and magnolia; spinescent or thorny, as in the jujube and goose berry. Some fall off before the leaves, as in the common fig and the lime; others are merely deciduous, or fall at the same time as the leaves; and there are others which continue for a longer or shorter time after the leaves have fallen, as in the jujube and gooseberry. The use of the stipules appears to be to protect the leaves before their expansion, as is evidently shown by their relative disposition in the buds of some orders of plants. See LEAVES.