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HOW PLANTS ARE PROPAGATED. 
Section II. — How Propagated by Seeds. 
163. Propagation from buds is really only the division, as it grows, of one 
plant into two or more, or the separation of shoots from a stock. Propagation 
from seed is the only true reproduction . In the seed an entirely new individual is 
formed. So the Seed, and the Fruit, in which the seed is produced, and the Flower i 
which gives rise to the fruit, are the Organs of Reproduction (2). 
164. Every species at some period or other produces seeds, or something which 
answers to seeds. Upon this distinction, namely, whether they bear true flowers 
producing genuine seeds, or produce something merely answering to flowers and 
seeds, is founded the grand division of all plants into two series or grades, that is, 
into Ph^enogamous or Flowering Plants, and Cryptogamous or Flow- 
erless Plants. 
165. Cryptogamous or Flowerless Plants do not bear real flowers, having stamens 
and pistils, nor produce real seeds, or bodies having an embryo ready formed in 
them. But they produce minute and very simple bodies which answer the purpose 
of seeds. To distinguish them from true seeds, they are called Spores. Ferns, 
Mosses, Lichens, and Seaweeds, are all flowerless plants, reproduced by spores. 
166. Phsenogamous or Flowering Plants are those which do bear flowers and seeds; 
the seed essentially consisting of an embryo or germ, ready formed within its 
coats, which has only to grow and unfold itself to become a plant ; as has been 
fully explained in the first and second sections of Chapter I. 
167. Flowerless plants have their organs too minute to be examined without 
much magnifying, and are too difficult for young beginners. The ordinary or 
Flowering class of plants will afford them abundant occupation. We are to study 
first the Flower, then the Fruit and Seed. 
Section III. — Flowers. 
§ 1. Their Arrangement on the Stem. 
168. Inflorescence is the term used by botanists for flower-clusters generally, or 
for the way blossoms are arranged on the stem. Everything about this is governed 
by a very simple rule, which is this : — 
169. Flower-buds appear in the same places that common buds (that is, leaf 
buds) do ; and they blossom out in the order of their age, the earliest-formed first, 
