BOTANY. 



as hemlock, water-parsnip, and fool's-parsley. These poi- 

 sonous species so strongly resemble esculent ones that 

 only botanists can distinguish them, and many persons 

 have made the fatal mistake of eating their roots. But the 

 carrot, parsnip, parsley, celery, lovage, caraway, corian- 

 der, etc., are common cultivated species of this order, and 

 none of the species are poison to the touch. 



In your rambles you will be likely to find a large, coarse- 

 looking, hairy or woolly, strong-scented plant, three or four 

 feet high, which grows in moist, cultivated grounds, from 

 Pennsylvania to Labrador, and west to Oregon. It has a 

 thick, furrowed stem, ternate leaves, with large, channeled, 

 clasping petioles, and blossoms in June, bearing huge um- 

 bels, often a foot broad. It is a species of cow-parsnip, 

 sometimes called masterwort. Its flowers have white, 

 deeply heart-shaped petals. As its parts are comparatively 

 large, the flower of this plant is here chosen to exhibit the 

 peculiarities of the order. In Fig. 432 it is given in sec- 

 tion, and here follows its schedule-description : 



SCHEDULE SIXTEENTH. 



