188 



DICOTYLEDONS URT1CACE.E DIAGRAM 15. 



proper bitter taste. The hop is 

 also a plant with separate sexes. 

 The female flowers grow in 

 clusters at the end of the stalks, 

 and somewhat resemble small 

 pine-cones, with very thin and 

 delicate scales. We shall come 

 to families in which all the 

 flowers are thus arranged in 

 similar clusters. It is the female 

 clusters of the hop which are 

 employed. 



The hops are planted at the foot 

 Female flower of Hop. Hop. of long poles six or eight yards 



high, up which the plant climbs. When the time to gather it has 

 come, the year's growth is cut, the pole is lowered, and the clusters 

 are gathered and dried for sale. At the bottom of each scale is 

 found a small quantity of a yellow bitter resinous substance, which 

 gives its taste to beer. 



The Mulberry is a very valuable tree, 

 not for the sake of its fruit, though this 

 is eatable, but because it is grown so exten- 

 sively in Southern Europe for feeding silk- 

 worms. 



The Fig is also an abundant tree through- 

 out Southern Europe, though only seen 

 occasionally in English gardens. Figs are 

 eaten either fresh or dried ; and dried figs 

 packed in boxes are very largely imported 

 Mulberry. into England. 



The Fig is a fruit which at once strikes us as peculiar, because 

 the fruit is not seen to succeed the flower on the tree. It is really 

 not a fruit like others. If we pluck a young fig and open it, we 

 perceive a cavity in the interior with an orifice at the top. On 



