INTRODUCTION. 5 



The STEM, (2,) is intended to support the flowers and leaves. 

 It grows upwards, and is furnished mostly with buds, which 

 afterwards expand into branches, leaves, or flowers. The trunks 

 of trees, and even their boughs and twigs, no less than the 

 shoots of the Grasses, the suckers of the Asparagus, and the 

 runners of the Strawberry, are stems, though they take these 

 other names to distinguish one kind from another. Now and 

 then the stem grows underground, as in the Mint and the Couch 

 Grass, when it is called a creeping root, but this term is 

 improper. 



The LEAF, (3,) is one of the folds of a bud expanded. It is 

 mostly thin and green, with or without a stalk. It is one of the 

 most important organs, as through its pores and vessels plants 

 are enabled to derive moisture and various gases from the air 

 around them, and also to throw off such matters as are ob- 

 noxious. Leaves are said to be simple when formed of one 

 piece only ; compound when several small leaves unite to 

 form one larger leaf ; and doubly compound when still more 

 divided. The manner of the folding up of the leaf in the bud, 

 before the latter is expanded, is called its vernation. 



Fulcra. Under this general term are included stings, 

 prickles, hairs, thorns, and every other part, besides those 

 mentioned above, except what relates to the flower itself ; as, 

 for example, STIPULES, (4,) are small leaves, different in shape 

 from the real leaves, and found only at the joints of the stem. 

 BRACTS, (5,) are small leaves or scales, which accompany a 

 flower only. A PEDUNCLE, (6,) or flower stalk, is that which 

 supports a flower used in distinction to the proper stem of the 

 plant, and to the stalk which forms part of a leaf, and which is 

 a PETIOLE,- (7,) or leaf stalk. 



The other figures of the cut show the different parts of the 

 flower a term which, although so common, is liable sometimes 

 to be misunderstood. Thus we hear of a Daisy flower, and a 



