104 STORIES OF PLANTS AND ANIMALS 



" Not much for roses, perhaps, but they are 

 devoted to cherries and strawberries." 



" What have they to do with roses ? " 



" A great deal, Tommy- Anne ; for they belong 

 to the Rose Family." 



" I don't understand about this one single bit ; 

 why do they belong to the Rose Family? what 

 makes a plant family ? " 



" There are great divisions that come first, 

 the plants with flowers, and the plants with only 

 rusty seed spots on their leaves, like the ferns. 

 Then those whose sap veins run up and down 

 the leaves, and those where the veins run across 

 like spider webbing. Then plants who thrust up 

 a single finger when they leave the seed, like the 

 grass and corn, and those that reach out two, like 

 the bean, for by these signs and many others the 

 plant world is divided into races, and after that 

 the families are made from the plants whose habits 

 follow some one of the many designs." 



" Then if a plant is not like any other, it has to 

 be a family by itself ? " 



" Yes, Tommy- Anne, and the House People 

 have given these orders and families long Latin 

 names; they are not easy to remember at first, 

 yet they all have a meaning, and you must learn 

 them before you can know how plants that look 



