82 FAMILIAR WILD FLOWERS. 



to these points we may at once call attention. All are 

 herbs, soft in texture, and making no solid wood, though 

 the stems are somewhat rough and fibrous. The leaves 

 are always arranged alternately on the stems,, and are 

 furnished at their bases with stipulate forms ; the leaves, 

 too, are always broad and rounded in general outline, the 

 veins all radiating from one point at their base like 

 the spokes of a wheel or the folds of a fan. The flowers 

 are always regular in form that is to say, they are 

 made up of a circular series of similar forms, and are there- 

 fore multi-symmetrical (not bi-symmetrical, or having only 

 their halves alike, as in the pansy or ground ivy blossoms) 

 when looked down upon in plan view. The calyx is 

 composed of five parts, arranged in a valvate manner 

 in the unopened bud, their margins being in contact, 

 while the parts do not overlap at all. The term is derived 

 from the Latin valvfe, folding-doors, as the parts of the 

 calyx all fit each regularly into their allotted spaces, 

 like the leaves of a folding-door. At the base, or some 

 other point on the outer surface of the calyx, three or 

 more little leaf-like bodies called bracts will be found, 

 forming a sort of subordinate or outer calyx, though as 

 they are not in contact with each other, it is rather to be 

 considered as a suggestion of a second ring, than an actual 

 development. In most of our species these little bracts 

 on the exterior of the true calyx are three in number, 

 but in two they vary from six to nine. The petals 

 are five in number, curiously twisted into a spiral before 

 expansion, as may clearly be seen in the half-opened 

 buds and flowers in our illustration. The stamens are 

 very numerous, and bound together at their bases, and 

 throughout a good portion of their length, into a pillar-like 



