ll INTRODUCTION TO BOTANY. 
§ 1. The Plant in general. 
5. Under the common term Plant. botanists include every being that 
has vegetable life ; from the lofty forest tree to the moss upon its stem, the 
mouldiness on our decaying provisions, or the green scum that floats on 
stagnant water. 
6. Every portion of a plant which has a distinct office or function to 
perform in the operations of vegetable life is called an Organ. 
7. The organs of plants are of two kinds, the elementary and the 
compound. 
8. Elementary organs are those ultimate parts or tisswes of which the 
body of a compound vegetable consists, viz. cellular tissue, woody tissue, 
and vascular tissue. 
9. Compound organs are formed by various combinations of the elemen- 
tary, and appear under the form of Root, Stem, Leaves, Flowers, 
Pruit. Of these the three first, whose function is to assist in the growth 
of the plant, are termed Organs of vegetation ; and the two last, whose office 
is the formation of seed, are the Organs of reproduction. 
10. All these compound organs, in some shape or other, exist at some 
period of the life of most, if not all, flowering plants, technically called 
phenogamous or phanerogamous plants ; which all bear flowers of more or 
less complex structure, and are all propagated by seeds containing a germ 
or embryo plantlet. Flowerless or cryptogamic plants (Ferns, Mosses, Fungi, 
Lichens, Seaweeds, etc.) have either very imperfect representatives of 
flowers, or are absolutely flowerless ; and are invariably propagated, not 
by seeds, but by spores, which do not contain any distinct germ or 
embryo. 
11. The elementary organs will be described afterwards ; we shall con- 
sider the compound under the following heads: Root, Rootstock, Stem, 
Leaves, Stipules, Bracts, Inflorescence, Flower, Perianth, Disk, Pistil, 
Ovule, Receptacle, Fruit, Seed. 
§ 2. The Root, 
12. The primary Root, or descending axis, grows downwards from the 
base of the stem, divides and spreads in the earth or water, and absorbs 
food for the plant through the extremities of its branches. 
18. Roots ordinarily produce neither buds nor leaves; their branches, 
called jidres when slender and long, proceed irregularly from any part of 
their surface ; and they increase in length by constant small additions to 
their extremities. i 
14. Though roots proceed usually from the base of the stem or root- 
stock, they may be formed at the base of any bud, especially if the bud lie 
along the ground, or elsewhere on the stem, if this is placed in cireum- 
stances favourable for their development. 
15. Roots are 
Jibrous, when they consist chiefly of slender fibres ; 
tuberous, when either the main foot or its branches are thickened into 
short, fleshy, or woody masses called tuders ; 
tap-roots, when the main root descends perpendicularly, emitting 
only very few fibrils, as in the Carrot. 
§ 38. The Rootstock or Rhizome. 
16. The Stock of a herbaceous perennial, in its complete state, includes 
a small portion of the summits of the previous year’s roots, as well as of 
the base of the previous year’s stems. Such stocks will increase yearly so 
as at length to form dense tufts. They will often preserve through the 
