THE AMERICAN EOTaXIST. 23 



Among: easily accessible American Works containing 

 colored plates of the green russula may be mentioned 

 Mcllvaine's "One Thousand American Fungi," plate 44; 

 Atkinson's "Mushrooms, Edible and Poisonous," plate 

 36; Taylor's "Mushrooms of America," plate 1; and 

 Peck's "Forty-eighth Report New York State Museum," 

 plate 31. 



BOTANY FOR BEGiNNERS--XVI. 



Before proceding in a discussion of the various plant 

 families, it maj^be well to have a summar}' of the principal 

 ones and the Orders into which the\' are grouped. At the 

 outset it should be noted that botanists are by no means 

 agreed as to the grouping of these families. It depends in 

 great measure upon the weight each scientist is willing to 

 givetothe characters that are considered distinctive. The 

 species in a genus all closely resemble one another as may 

 be seen in such genera as Kosa and Viola ; but the genera 

 in a famih' are less alike. The herbaceous clovers, the 

 shrubby indigos {Amorpha) and trees like the locust 

 {Robinia) are placed in the same family as the peas and 

 beans. And just as the members of a family are less alike 

 than the members of a genus, so the families in an order 

 are often so little alike that one would scarcely discover 

 the relationship at first glance. The Rosales is a good 

 example. It is, of course, understood that stronger ties of 

 kinship unite these families to one another than tbe3^ do 

 to other families and this explains the fact that the fami- 

 lies in an order may have many superficial differences. 

 Thus it happens that an order characterized by inferior 

 ovaries may have some members with ovaries superior, 

 while in sympetalous orders some species or genera may 

 be polypetalous. In a general way the orders may be 

 separated by the characters indicated in the following 

 table : 



