viii A GUIDE TO THE WILD FLOWERS 



in the book for the moment, we find "Petals or colored 

 sepals 5 or more," or "Petals 4." Hepatica is in the first of 

 these which leads us to No. 496, and turning to that number 

 we must again decide between two minor categories. Hepat- 

 ica having obviously lobed leaves we know the end of our 

 hunt is near, and by making one or two further decisions 

 we come to the final one which reads "Petals none; petal- 

 like sepals 7-12 — Hepatica No. 498." Turning finally to that 

 number we find the description and picture of the flower, 

 and learn, perhaps for the first time that Hepatica has no 

 petals but only petal-like colored sepals. 



While the technicalities have been reduced to bare bones, 

 it should be remembered that there is no absolutely painless 

 method of identifying wild flowers. For plants possess roots, 

 stems, leaves, flowers, fruit and seed, and each of these is 

 of different shape, and color, and texture, and it is upon 

 these differences that their identification is based. If the 

 reader does not know these parts, he can learn them in ten 

 minutes from the picture glossary near the end of the book. 



Plant Names. 



One or sometimes two common names have been found for 

 practically all the plants in the book. For those who may wish 

 to know their Latin names these are also included, according 

 to those used in Britton & Brown's "Illustrated Flora of the 

 Northern States and Canada." The other standard work on 

 the flora of the region is the Seventh Edition of Gray's 

 Manual, and wherever these two books differ both names 

 have been included here, the Gray Manual name always in 

 brackets. 



Cross-Referencing and the Finding List. 



While the flowers are not all arranged according to family, 

 although this has been done in some cases, the value of know- 

 ing what other plants in the book belong to a particular 

 family is unquestionable. This has been accomplished by a 

 system of cross-referencing by numbers. These may be ig- 



