INTRODUCTORY LESSONS 



IN 



STKUCTURAL BOTANY. 



SECTION 1.— THE BEGINNINGS OE i^LANT LIEE. 



1, If the first rain of the wet season is followed by warm, sunny- 

 weather, specks of green will soon api^ear among the dry stems of last 

 year's weeds; and in fence corners or other eddy nooks where summer 

 winds have drifted seeds and covered them with dust, you may find i3er- 

 fect mats of baby plants. With a shovel skim off a few square inches of 

 this plant-bearing soil, and carefully examine it. Except a few green 

 needles, Avhich you recognize as spears of grass, most of these little plants 

 seem to consist of white stems, which split at the top into pairs of green 

 leaves. Looking sharply, you may find between each pair of leaves a 



1 . Seed of Bxir-clover just be- 

 for<! it appears above grouud. 2. 

 Same three days older. 3 . Mus- 

 tard. 4. liur clover ghowing the 

 first and second plumule leaves; 

 the former simple (apparently), 

 the 1 itter with three leaflets. 5. 

 Mallows (Malvaborealis), show- 

 ing the long-petoled see 1 leaves 

 {Cotyledons , and one plumule 

 leaf unfolded. 6- Filaria (Ero- 

 dium), with lobed or sub-com- 

 pound seed leaves. 



tiny bud; or, in the older plants, this may have grown other leaves, which 

 curiously enough are not like tlie first two, (Figures 1 to 6). Searching 

 through the shovelful of earth you will likely find plants in all stages of 

 growth, from swollen and sprouting seeds to stems, Avhich are just push- 

 ing their bowed leaf-heads into the sunlight. Here, then, is material 

 from which you may learn how plants grow; a lesson, remember, which 

 no text-book or schoolmaster can teach 3'ou. It will be easier, however, 

 since most of these early wild plants come from very small seeds, to take 



