CHAPTER IV. 



BOTANICAL CHARACTERS. 



Day by day did Hiawatha 



Go to wait and watch beside it 



Till at last a small green feather 

 From the earth shot slowly upwards, 

 Then another and another, 

 And before the summer ended, 

 Stood the maize in all its beauty, 

 With its shining robes about it 

 And its long, soft, yellow tresses. 

 And in rapture, Hiawatha 

 Cried aloud, " It is Mondamin ! 

 Yes, the friend of man, Mondamin ! " 



— Hiawatha. 



'Tis sweet . . . to . . . scent the breathing maize at setting day. 



— Collins. 



59. Botanical Relationship. — Maize belongs to the group CHAP, 

 of Monocotyledons, and the family Gramineae, or Grasses ; IV - 

 it is the type of the tribe Maydeae to which the genera 

 Euchlasna, Coix, and Tripsacum also belong. Of these, 

 Euchlsena (Fig. 10) is its nearest relative, and the only one 

 with which it is known to hybridize. Some botanists are 

 inclined to consider Euchla;na as the prototype of Zea, for the 

 latter is not known in a truly wild state. Montgomery 

 considers that Zea and Euchlaena may have had a common 

 origin, and that in the process of evolution the pistillate spikes 

 in teosinte were probably developed from the lateral branches 

 of a tassel-like structure, while maize was developed from the 

 central spike (cf. Fig. 40) [Bowman and Crossley, 1). 



60. Description. — -The maize plant (Figs. 1 1 and 12) is a tall, 

 annual, monoecious grass, with stout, erect, solid stem, and 

 broad leaves ; the staminate flowers form a terminal panicle ; 

 the pistillate flowers are arranged in a densely-crowded spike, 



65 5 



