HAIR, or Down, of plants, a general term expressive of all the hairy and glandular appearances on the surface of plants, to which these are supposed by naturalists to serve the double purpose of defensive weapons and vessels of secretion.
These hairs are minute threads of greater or less length and solidity; some of them being visible to the naked eye, whilst others are rendered so only by the help of glasses. Examined by a microscope, almost all the parts of plants, particularly the young stalks or stems, appear covered with hairs.
Hairs on the surface of plants present themselves under various forms; in the leguminous plants, they are generally cylindric; in the mallow tribe, they terminate in a point; in agrimony, they are shaped like a fish-hook; in nettle, they are awl-shaped and jointed; and in some compound flowers with hollow or funnel-shaped florets, they terminate in two crooked points.
Probable as some experiments have rendered it, that the hairs on the surface of plants contribute to some organical secretion, their principal use seems to be to preserve the parts in which they are lodged from the effect of violent friction, from winds, from extremes of heat and cold, and such like external injuries.
M. Guettard, who, from the form, situation, and other circumstances of the hairy and glandular appearances on the surface of plants, established a botanical method, has demonstrated, that these appearances are generally constant and uniform in all the plants of the same genus. The same uniformity seems likewise to characterise all the different genera of the same natural order.
The different sorts of hairs which form the down upon the surface of plants were imperfectly distinguished by Grew in 1682, and by Malpighi in 1686. M. Guettard was the first who examined the subject both as a botanist and a philosopher. His observations were published in 1747.