PI,ANTS WITHOUT FI.OWERS 125 



ally with regard to the reproductive parts. The followinp; account 

 is only meant to refer to parts which can easily be observed. 



There is a great number of forms which would be puzzling 

 to those who are not botanists. Common forms may be found 

 growing in moist places on the ground or on the trunks or limbs of 

 trees. These plants consist of small stems clothed with minute 

 green leaves. The stems are fastened to the ground by means of 

 thick felt or hair-like threads. The whole plant is a beautiful 

 and interesting object seen under the simple microscope. A simple 

 leaf under liigher powers shows a thin plate consisting of a single 

 layer of plant cells. The green grains in the cells are chlorophyll 

 bodies. These are the same in all green leaves. 



Those pupils who are ready for it, may be taught that it is 

 by means of these bodies that the plant is able to make such 

 substances as starch out of carbonic acid and water, the two 

 great food substances of the plant. It would do no violence to 

 any correct pedagogical principle to tell any one who can see the 

 green grains that by means of them the plant in sunlight, makes 

 starch out of carbonic acid and water. As it is in mosses, so it is 

 all plants. When the subject of the use of chlorophyll is taken 

 up, the moss leaf is one of the most convenient objects in which 

 to see the chlorophyll well. (See topic, ''The Plant's Food.") 



The moss reproduces by means of spores. These in many 

 common forms are contained in a little vessel on the lop of a 

 slender stalk which raises it above the general bed of moss. 



The spores sown in moist places first grow into minute green 

 threads (protonema). These, in time, bear minute buds which 

 develop into the moss plants as we generally see them. 



The cliildren may find difi'erent forms of mosses; find their 

 spore-bearing parts; the protonemal stage passing into the adult 

 plant. Flower pots in which other plants are growing, if kept 

 moist, often have all of these stages. 



Note to the teacher: — For your.-^elf, you will find it a matter 



