14 A COMPENDIUM OF 
to form families or orders; those bearing the 
least resemblance make up the genus (plural, 
genera), whilst proportion, color and shape go 
to form the species. Thus, the four likenesses 
together make up the whole system of natural 
botany. Let us therefore compare the classes 
to cities, the orders to towns, the genera to 
villages, and the species to the inhabitants. 
All the vegetable world is divided into two 
grades or series: flowering and flowerless. The 
first are known as Phzenerogamous, and pro- 
duce their species by means of real flowers, 
having manifest organs of reproduction, which 
form seeds, these seeds containing an embryo 
for a new plant of the same kind. The flower- 
ing plants are divided into two classes and two 
sub-classes, the first being termed and known 
technically as Exogenous or Dicotyledonous, - 
whilst cl ss two. are called Endogenous or 
Monocotyledonous The Exogens, or Dicoty- 
ledons, as the names indicate, are outward 
growers and have two cotyledons, the stems of 
which are made up of pith, wood and bark ; 
the leaves have a network of veins and vein- 
lets, whilst the flowers occur inan arran gement 
of four and five together asa cluster. The 
seed is a pair of cotyledons or more, as is the 
case with the pines, 
While this class includes 
the giants of the forest, it also contains some 
of the most insignificant vines, Let us again 
refer to the class first, because it is divided into 
sub-classes one and two, the first constitutes 
the Angiosperms and the second Gymnosperms, 
the former having a seed vessel and a regular 
pistil, and the latter being naked, as the word 
