COMPOUND FLOWERS. 21 



ridges, whereas Parsley has a seed marked with five 

 equal inconspicuous lines. 



CHAPTER VI. 



OF COMPOUND FLOWKHS. 



The true character of these common flowers are 

 but little suspected by ordinary observers. Thus the 

 flower of the White-weed or Ox-eye Daisy (Chry- 

 santhemum Leucanthemum), but too common in our 

 dry pastures, in place of being a single flower, as 

 every body supposes who has not studied its charac- 

 ter, is, in fact, an aggregate of some hundreds of 

 minute flowers, most of them provided with a corolla, 

 stamens, styles, and seed, as perfect in their kind as 

 the flower of the Tuiip or the Lily. To be con- 

 vinced of this, you have only to take it up and 

 examine it with a little care by the help of the most 

 simple microscope. You will perceive that this flow- 

 er consists of two principal parts, namely, a yellow 

 centre, and a white border. The yellow floscules in 

 the centre, called the disc of the flower, and which 

 appear little bigger than so many anthers, consist of a 

 funnel-formed corolla, with a five-toothed border. 

 Within this corolla exists a yellow tube, formed of five 

 anthers joined together in the form of a cylinder ; at 

 their base, indeed, the five filaments appear distinct, 

 and are elastic, curling up when torn from the corolla. 

 Through the centre of this tube of anthers passes the 

 style, terminated by a bifid, reflected stigma ; below 

 is attached the germ which becomes the seed, and in 

 many of these plants, as in the Dandelion, the seed 

 is crowned by an egret or downy plume, by which it 

 becomes wafted abroad to considerable distances. 



