BOTANY FOR YOUNG PEOPLE. 107 



The truth is, as I remarked to you before, thai 

 knowledge of species is the important considera- 

 tion, so much so that it is asserted that no one 

 can be entitled to the appellation of a bota- 

 nist until that person has dissected and gathered 

 at least three hundred different plants. 



TENTH CONVERSATION. 



L. Why is it, Emily, that by cutting off a 

 slip from a rose bush and planting it I can have 

 another bush as large as the first? Does the 

 end of the slip begin to rot and then turn into 

 roots, merely because it is put in the ground ? 

 I remember reading a fact stated in a book, 

 which said that it made no difference what part 

 of a plant was put in the ground, all would in 

 such a case equally change the offices : that 

 if a tree was turned upside down the former 

 roots would change to branches and bear leaves, 

 and the old branches and leaves turn to roots. 



E. That was a wrong statement ; but to ex- 

 plain why it is so, I must take a somewhat 

 round-about -way of making you understand 



