SOME LESSONS IN BOTANY 49 
yield even more abundantly. By the study of botany we 
learn to reason out why plants behave as they do under cer- 
tain conditions, and how they would behave under certain 
other conditions. We may thus become investigators of the 
many problems about plants that are still unsolved. 
As an aid in the study of this chapter it is well to have a 
good variety of house plants in the schoolroom where they 
may be under constant observation. A list of suitable kinds 
will be found in the chapter on School Gardens. House 
plants are often kept merely for their ornamental value, but 
they might also be of great help in our education if we would 
give them the necessary attention to get acquainted with 
them. The pupils should know the name of each plant, 
how it is propagated, its habits of life, its specific needs that 
must be satisfied in the care wé give it, and all important 
characteristics of its leaves, roots, stem, blossoms, and seeds. 
THE PLant AS A WHOLE 
Parts of a Plant. — All ordinary plants, with their many 
diversities of form and size, are constructed on the same 
general plan: they all consist of stem, roots, and leaves, 
and periodically develop flowers and fruit. Notice that 
this is true of grains and grasses with their slender, un- 
branched stems and long, narrow leaves; it is true of the 
great trees, and likewise of the little plants that lie pros- 
trate upon the ground, as the common purslane and white 
clover. In all plant studies therefore we are largely con- 
cerned with these five parts, — stem, roots, leaves, flower, and 
fruit. 
Woody Plants and Herbaceous Plants. — When the stem 
is composed of hard, woody tissue, it lives through the winter 
and from year to year, and we then have a tree or shrub. 
