ENQUIRY INTO PLANTS, VII. vm. 1-3 



and fibrous stems, some prostrate stems, 1 as malakhe 

 (cheese-flower) wild chervil ' wild cucumber' (squirting 

 cucumber) ; while heliotropion' 1 has this character 3 to 

 an even greater extent, and so, among spinous plants, 

 have caltrop caper and several others ; for in these 

 too the above-mentioned distinction is even more 

 marked. Some again have clasping stems, but if 

 they have nothing on which to throw themselves, 

 their stems become prostrate, as epetine bedstraw and 

 in general those which have a slender soft long stem ; 

 wherefore these in general grow in the midst of 4 

 other plants. This point of difference too is common 

 not only to all herbaceous plants and under-shrubs, 

 but also to shrubby ones ; for helix (ivy) has a clasping 

 stem, and, still more, smilax. 



Again of herbaceous plants too some have several 

 stems, some only one ; and of the latter some have 

 no side-shoots along the stem, while others have 

 side-shoots, for instance, among cultivated plants 

 radish and some others. Those with prostrate stems 

 have generally more than one, while those with 

 erect stems have but one or a few. Of these those 

 with smooth stems have no side-shoots, as onion leek 

 garlic the wild, as well as the cultivated forms ; 

 and of these 5 again some have straight, some crooked 

 stems. 



There is also the following point of difference in 

 herbaceous plants : some have their leaves on the 

 ground, some on the stem, some have both characters. 

 The following have ground leaves crowsfoot 6 the 



3 roiovrov conj. Sch. from G ; TOVTWV Aid. 



4 ev ; G seems to have read <-TT . 



5 ro'ts T] Depots probably repeated by mistake from above. 



6 cf. G.P. 2. 5. 4; Pl'in. 22. 48; Diosc. 2. 130. 



109 



