58 HOW PLANTS ARE PROPAGATED. 



Section II. — How Propagated by Seeds. 



1G3. Propagation from buds is really only the division, as it grows, of one 

 plant into two or more, or the separation of shoots from a stock. Propagation 

 from seed is the only true reproduction. In the seed an entirely new individual is 

 formed. So the Seed, and the Fruit, in which the seed is produced, and the Flower, 

 which gives rise to the fruit, are the Organs of Reproduction (2). 



164. Every species at some period or other produces seeds, or something which 

 answers to seeds. Upon this distinction, namely, whether they bear true flowers 

 producing genuine seeds, or produce something merely answering to flowers and 

 seeds, is founded the grand division of all plants into two series or grades, that is, 

 into Ph^nogamous or Flowering Plants, and Cryptogamous or Flow- 

 ERLESS Plants. 



165. Cryptogamous or FloWCrleSS Plants do not bear real flowers, having stamens 

 and pistils, nor produce real seeds, or bodies having an embryo ready formed in 

 them. But they produce minute and very simple bodies which answer the purpose 

 of seeds. To distinguish them from true seeds, they are called Spores. Ferns, 

 Mosses, Lichens, and Seaweeds, are all flowerless plants, reproduced by spores. 



166. rilOBllOgamous or Flowering Plants are those which do bear flowers and seeds; 

 the seed essentially consisting of an embryo or germ, ready formed within its 

 coats, which has only to grow and unfold itself to become a plant ; as has been 

 fully explained in the first and second sections of Chapter I. 



167. Flowerless plants have their organs too minute to be examined without 

 much magnifying, and are too difficult for young beginners. The ordinary or 

 Flowering class of plants will afford them abundant occupation. We are to study 

 first the Flower, then the Fruit and Seed. 



Section III. — Flowers. 

 § 1. Their Arrangement on the Stem. 



168. Inflorescence is the term used by botanists for flower-clusters generally, or 

 for the way blossoms are arranged on the stem. Everything about this is governed 

 by a very simple rule, which is this : — 



169. Flower-buds appear in the same places that common buds (that is, leaf- 

 buds) do ; and they blossom out in the order of their age, the earliest-formed first, 



