138 WAYSIDE WEEDS* 



field or garden to learn that. This green stalk of 

 groundsel, or of cMckweed, or even the young 

 shoot of rose, bramble, or honeysuckle, breaks off 

 easily enough in your hand, and gives you a speci- 

 men of the herbaceous stem, but try some of the 

 older second year's growths of the last-named 

 plants, and you will find them tough enough, they 

 are no longer herbaceous, but woody. You have 

 here a practical example of the two kinds of stems 

 and plants ; the first herbaceous, green, succulent, 

 and easily broken, such as are formed by one 

 summer's growth ; the second, brownish, tough, 

 and woody, such as we find in shrubs and trees in 

 or after their second year of existence. Between 

 the well-marked herbaceous stem of the quick- 

 growing weed, and the hardened heart-wood of 

 the oak, we have, of course, every grade of dis- 

 tinction. 



Compound or branched stems, and simple 

 stems, give us another division. The first are so 

 common, and comprise such a large proportion of 

 our trees and shrubs, that to cite example would 

 be superfluous ; as to the latter, the grasses, such 

 as wheat, rye-grass, the sedges, etc., give us gopd 

 examples, and the common foxglove, amid others, 

 an excellent one. The simple unbranched stem 

 which supports the head of the dandelion, the 

 umbel of the cowshp, or the spike of the plantain, 

 and which is known as the scape, is more properly 



