EXOGENS OR DICOTYLEDONS 



months they convert hot sandy or rocky wastes into frag- 

 rant bee pastures. 



The higher groups of dicotyledons consist mainly of 

 plants with more conspicuous flowers, that is, they have 

 learned to get help from insects, and the highest groups of 

 all have united their petals so as to get the most possible 

 good from their guests. The group next above the weedy 

 group has flowers with little or no union of parts. Many 

 of those with their parts all quite separate, belong to the 

 buttercup family, and you will think the family resemblance 

 very slight when you know that it includes, besides the 

 buttercup, the clematis, meadow-rue, larkspur, columbine 

 and peony. If you can collect the fruits of this family, you 

 will understand more about their kinship. The magnolia and 

 laurel families, too, have flowers with their parts not united. 

 Perhaps you know the laurel, or bay tree, of our canons; 

 you are likely to miss its small greenish flowers because 

 they come so early in the winter, but you will remember 

 its beautiful, dark, glossy leaves, especially their spicy odor 

 and taste, and you will not be surprised to learn that cinna- 

 mon, nutmeg, mace, cassia buds, camphor and sassafras all 

 come from plants nearly related to the bay-laurel. 



Some of the wild flowers noticed in Chapter IX. belong 

 in this group; the violet, poppy and mustard and all their 

 relatives. How many relatives of the mustard have you 

 found? Shepherd's purse and pepper grass, if you have 

 kept a sharp lookout on wayside weeds, and water cress 

 along streams, sweet alyssuni in gardens, radish, cabbage 

 and turnip about old vegetable gardens, besides a goodly 

 number of wild flowers, including the wallflower and others 

 not showy enough to have common names. This large and 

 vigorous family, then, contains some members that seem to 

 us quite useless; others, the weeds, that are worse than use- 

 less; but some that are ornamental, and still others decidedly 

 useful. The sharp, biting taste, which must protect the 



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