OUTLINES OF PLANT LIFE. 



PART I: THE PLAMT BODY. 



CHAPTER I. 

 INTRODUCTION. 



1. Living matter. — By the combination of powers called 

 life, each living thing controls, for a longer or shorter time, 

 a certain amount of material, which constitutes its body. 

 This material is arranged into definite form ; some remains 

 only for a short time as part of the body and is then discarded; 

 other material remains part of the body as long as life exists. 



That which is changing most rapidly is the living substance, 

 called protoplasm. If there are parts of the body not living, 

 they have been formed by the protoplasm and are generally 

 controlled by it. 



2. Members. — When the body is large, it is easy to see 

 that it is made up of more or less distinct parts. These are its 

 members. As a rule, the smaller it is, the fewer and less dis- 

 tinct are the members. There are many thousands of plants 

 in which the body does not have any members, but can be 

 distinguished only into the units of which it is built, called 

 cells. Still others consist of a single cell. 



In the largest plants the more important members may be 

 divisible into smaller subordinate ones. When these are in- 



