BOTANY. 



CHAPTER I. 



PLANT ARCHITECTURE. 



The Vegetable Kingdom. Leading characters of plants con- 

 trasted with those of animals. Origin of " Division of Labour." 

 Uses of the various organs of plants. Modifications of structure 

 caused by external agencies. Microscopic structures. 



TO those whose schooldays terminated a quarter of a 

 century ago, the word Botany, as a rule, recalls to 

 memory long strings of Greek or Latin names, or dry 

 and uninteresting definitions of the various parts of 

 plants ; hence it is not difficult to understand the in- 

 difference manifested by such victims towards the study 

 of a science which yields to none in the varied beauty of 

 its members, neither in the manifestation of those peculiar 

 features characteristic of life. 



The popular conception of life is as a rule associated 

 more intimately with the members of the Animal King- 

 dom, and more especially with the most highly developed 

 forms with which we are most familiar, where movement 

 and a more or less perfect development of the special 

 senses, as seeing, hearing, etc., are present. As a matter of 

 course, it is generally known that plants are living bodies ; 

 but there are not unfrequently indications of an inward 



B 



