230 THE STORY OF THE PLANTS. 



our attention to the highest division of the 

 highest group of the highest half of the vegetable 

 kingdom. The rest are for us mere inconspicu- 

 ous mosses, moulds, or seaweeds. 



The fruit-producing group of flowering plants 

 are finally divided into the dicotyledons and the 

 monocotyledons, whose chief differences I have 

 already pointed out to you. And to complete 

 our picture of this infinite hierarchy, the dicoty- 

 ledons, once more, are divided into various 

 families, such as the buttercups, the roses, the 

 crucifers, the composites, the labiates, the 

 umbellates, the saxifrages, and the catkin- 

 bearers. The buttercup family, in particular (to 

 select a single group), is further divisible into 

 genera, such as buttercup, marsh marigold, 

 larkspur, anemone, clematis, and aconite ; while 

 the buttercup genus (to take one only among 

 these) comprises in turn a vast number of 

 species, such as the water-crowfoot, the ivy- 

 leaved crowfoot, the meadow buttercup, the 

 bulbous buttercup, the lesser celandine, the 

 goldilocks, and so on for pages. Similarly, the 

 monocotyledons are divided into various families, 

 such as the orchids, lilies, grasses, and sedges : 

 the families are divided into many genera ; and 

 each genus into several species. The infinite 

 variety of circumstances is such that each type 

 goes on varying and varying for ever in order to 

 nt itself for the endless situations it is called 

 upon to fill, and the endless diversity in the 

 accidents of climate or soil or position that it 

 may chance to come across. Thus we have in 

 England* more than a hundred different kinds of 



