

THE CLOVERS AND OTHER GRASSES. 



CHAPTER I. 



In the very outset of our investigation of the subject of the 

 clovers, it is important to notice the distinction between these 

 and the other grasses. While in popular usage we apply the 

 term grasses to all kinds of herbage that is summer food for 

 the lower animals, botanically speaking clover is not a grass. 

 The term grass .. pertains to plants with simple leaves, stems 

 generally jointed and tubular, husks or chaff, technichally 

 called glumes, in pairs and seeds single. A slight observa- 

 tion will show that the clovers do not belong to this class. 

 The true grasses include all our commonly called grasses, the 

 clovers excepted, and besides nearly all our grains, such as 

 wheat, oats, barley and corn and also the sorghums. Clover 

 belongs to the Leguminosce, or Pulse familiy, and to the same 

 family belong peas, beans, and vetches, sanfoin, lupines 

 and many others among what are popularly termed grasses . 

 It includes a large number of weeds such as wild indigo, 

 wild peas, shoestring, etc., also a large number of shrubs 

 such as the Wisteria, Carragana, Robinia, etc., and forest trees 

 of which the locusts are the best known in the temperate 

 zone and logwood and mahogany in the torrid zone. There 

 are 6500 known species of Leguminos<z, it being surpassed by 

 but one family, that of the Composite, to which belong the 

 goldenrods, asters and sunflowers, and in the wealth of its 

 products for the supply of human wants the family of the 

 Leguminosce surpasses all others. 



The Clovers as a rule differ from the other grasses in theii 

 habit of root growth. Most true grasses throw out their roots 



