12 SPRING FLOWERS. 



(b) This monopetalous corolla either epigynous_, bearing the 

 stamens ; or altogether distinct from the stamens ; or 

 hypogynous, bearing the stamens. 



Of the first of these subdivisions we have some early-flower- 

 ing examples in the family of Composites, or Compound flowers. 

 Among them is the common, well-known, golden-flowered 

 Dandelion,"^ to be found everywhere, and combining in itself 

 the characters of a gay spring flower, a troublesome weed, and 

 a valuable remedial agent. This plant has a thick, fleshy tap- 

 root, from the crown of which spreads a tuft of oblong run- 

 cinately pinnatifid leaves, among which spring up numerous 

 hollow peduncles, bearing, not a large yellow flower as is the 

 vulgar notion, but a head of numerous yellow flowers of pecu- 

 liar character. It is the fact of their bearing numerous flowers 

 in one head, and so as to seem to constitute a single flower 

 only, that has procured for the large family to which the Dan- 

 delion belongs, the name of Composites, or Compound flowers. 

 Let us examine one of these a little more closely. At the top 

 of the stalk are two or three rows of crowded green scaly 

 leaves, of which the innermost are erect, and the outer ones 

 recurved ; these constitute the involucre or guard-leaves, which 

 in the Composite plants are always found surrounding the 

 flower-heads, and the parts of which are called bracts or scales. 

 The top of the stalk is expanded into a broadish flattened sur- 

 face, which the involucral leaves fence round, and on this sur- 

 face, which is called the receptacle, the flowers are closely packed 

 side by side. The Dandelion belongs to a group of Composites 

 in which the flowers are all alike — all ligulate or strap-shaped, 

 and hence the group has been named Ligulates. Take up one 

 of the flowers, — they are here properly called florets, or little 

 flowers, — and let us see of what it consists. At the base is a 



* Leoniodon Taraxacum — Plate 3 B. 



