SCIENCE PRIMERS. 



BOTANY. 



I. INTRODUCTORY. 



THE study of Botany is best commenced with the 

 careful observation of the different parts of living 

 plants, their positions and arrangement in reference 

 to one another, the order in which they make their 

 appearance, and their uses to the plant itself. It is 

 hence often called a science of observation, in con- 

 trast to Chemistry and other subjects of which the 

 study must necessarily commence with experiment. 

 But Botany is also an experimental science ; only the 

 experiments by which we investigate the growth of 

 plants, their modes of living and multiplying, and 

 their relations to the air and soil, require much to have 

 been learnt first by observation alone. Such experi- 

 ments require also for the most part a previous know- 

 ledge of Chemistry and Physics; those, however, 

 described in this Primer will need no more knowledge 

 of these subjects than is to be found in the Primers 

 devoted to them. 



Plants are living things ; they form the Vege- 

 table Kingdom as animals form the Animal King- 

 dom. Like animals, plants pass through the stages 



