ACOTYLEDONS DIAGRAM 18. 209 



CLASS OF ACOTYLEDONS, 



OR PLANTS WITH NO COTYLEDON. 



All the plants which still remain to be noticed, and which 

 form the class of acotyledous, are distinguished from the others, 

 not only because the embryo has no cotyledons, but because the 

 plants themselves have no flowers. They never bear either pis- 

 tils or stamens. At the proper season, seeds appear at some 

 part of the plant, but do not succeed to flowers. These seeds 

 themselves are most frequently of extraordinary minuteness, so 

 that they resemble dust, like the pollen of coniferae. They are so 

 different from all other seeds that they have received a special 

 name, and are called spores. Some families of the acotyledons 

 still resemble other plants to some extent by their greenness and 

 a kind of foliage, but there are others, such as mould and fungi, 

 which are entirely different from ordinary plants. 



