COMPARING AND CLASSIFYING PLANTS. 77 



will, perhaps, be helpful before we pass to the regular work 

 of the exercise. 



The buttercup thrives best in low, damp places. It is 

 like frogs in this respect ; and, because of this, it is named 

 after them. Its botanical name is Ranunculus, from Rana, 

 a frog. The Ranunculus has certain characters with which 

 you are familiar. Now, when you find other plants which 

 are very much like it, that is, which present nearly the 

 same group of characters, particularly those of cohesion 

 and adhesion, you class them with it, you say they belong 

 with the buttercup ; or, in more botanical language, they 

 belong to the Ranunculaceae. In some regions this plant, 

 from the form of its leaf, is called the Crowfoot, and 

 plants closely resembling it are said, therefore, to belong 

 to the Crowfoot family. Now, the resemblance of the 

 columbine to the buttercup entitles it to belong to the 

 Ranunculaceae. The monk's-hood and larkspur also be- 

 long to the same family, and this will give you some idea 

 of the degree of similarity that should exist between mem- 

 bers of one family. 



Our object in the present exercise is, to fix upon a 

 method by which to begin the work of classifying plants, 

 by comparing the groups of characters they present, and 

 putting together those that are most alike. 



Get a pocket note-book. Write in it, boldly and plain- 

 ly, the flower-schedules of the following plants : Butter- 

 cup, shepherd's -purse, mustard or radish, catchfly, mal- 

 lows, Saint-John's-wort, clover, pea or bean, wild rose, 

 strawberry, geranium, violet, morning-glory. 



Now, why have we put these particular schedules into 

 the note-book ? Compare them with each other. Do you 

 not see that the statements in the cohesion and adhesion 

 columns are widely unlike ? This is why we have chosen 

 them. They are so many different examples of the make- 

 up of flowers, and you have simply to compare each flower 

 you describe with one and another of these examples, to 



