SUPPLEMENT 



CHAPTER XIII 



PLANT FAHILIES, PART I. ENDOGENS OR 

 nONOCOTYLEDONS. 



Botanists do not agree upon the classification of lower plants, and if 

 there were a settled system it would hardly be taken up to any extent 

 in grammar grades. In a general way, Algae are considered in Chap- 

 ter I of the Reader, Fungi in Chapter IV, and Archegoniatye, including 

 Bryophytes and Pteridophytes, in Chapter VI. Gymnosperuis would 

 have a chapter by themselves if they were generally accessible to school 

 children. Gymnosperms include, besides the Coniferse, two orders, 

 mainly foreign ; the cycads, resembling tree ferns or palms and 

 frequently seen in green houses; and the order Gnetaceae, or joint firs, 

 shrubs or trees with jointed, rush-like stems ; we have a few species 

 of one shrubby genus on our deserts. Some characteristics of Conif- 

 erae are easily developed, such as their size, general outline, resin- 

 ous juice, scale-like or needle-like leaves, persistent in all our species, 

 (we have no larches) and their cone-like flower clusters. Representa- 

 tives of two groups are illustrated in Chapter VIII, and the flowers 

 are described in the Supplement. 



Of the cypress group, the Monterey Cypress has already been 

 described ; its scale-like leaves and oblong or roundish cones are 

 typical ; the group includes, besides the cypress, the cedar, arbor vitas 

 and juniper, the juniper differing from the others in having drupe- 

 like fruits. Introduced specimens of these genera are common in 

 cultivation. Our native incense cedar, Libocedrus decurrens, Torr., 

 is widely distributed in the mountains ; under favorable conditions it 

 attains a height of one hundred and fifty feet, and so is reckoned in 

 with the California mountain giants that in the Sierras form perhaps 

 the most remarkable forest belt in the world. The incense cedar in 

 its prime is a beautiful, spicy, symmetrical tree, its downward curving 

 branches being described as great, " ferny plumes." Our native juni- 

 pers, with thick, sturdy trunk and limbs, adapt themselves to high, 

 rocky and arid regions. 



