664 BOTANY AS APPLIED TO VETERINARY SCIENCE. 
two of the subdivisions into which Exogens are divided, 
viz., Thalamiflorve and Calyciflorce , the former having “ both 
calyx and corolla, the latter consisting of distinct petals, the 
stamens always hypogynous or united to the sides of the ovary ;” 
the latter et having both calyx and corolla, having distinct 
petals, stamens always perigynons or growing on the sides of the 
calyx” 
The description of the next important plant, from the 
extent of its cultivation and the large quantity of food it 
yields—the Beta vulgaris (or mangold-wurzel )—will enable us to 
become familiar with another subdivision of Exogens. The 
plant belongs to the class of Exogens and to the subdivision 
Monochlamydeee (“flowers having no corolla , and sometimes not 
even a calyx”), and to the natural order Chenopodiacea ( ( goose- 
hoots) , having ' 6 calyx herbaceous, sometimes tubular at the 
base, or none; stamens inserted into the base of the calyx, 
opposite its segments; ovary single superior, or occasionally 
adhering to the tube of the calyx, with a single ovule attached 
to the base of the cavity ; style in two or four divisions, rarely 
simple; fruit membranous, sometimes baccate; herbaceous 
plants or undershrubs ; leaves alternate, without stipules, occa¬ 
sionally opposite; flowers small, sometimes polygamous.” 
— Bindley . The plant itself may be known by the follow¬ 
ing characters :— t( Beta vulgaris. —Calyx five-parted, half¬ 
adhering to the ovarium at the base, stamens five, styles two. 
Fruit reniform, enveloped in the capsular base of the calyx. 
Roots fusiform, very fleshy, biennial, radical; leaves ovate, 
obtuse, somewhat cordate, those of the stem rhomboid-ovate 
spikes leafy.”— Bindley. This, the common beet , is a plant 
familiar to most of us as being cultivated in our gardens, and 
was known to both Greeks and Romans, and held in great 
repute by them, as forming an article of diet, but the 
mangold-wurzel, which is considered by most botanists to be 
a variety of the common beet, was first cultivated as an 
article of food for cattle and for the manufacture of sugar in 
Germany and Switzerland. Its name, mangold-wurzel, is 
derived from the German, and means (e the root of scarcity,” 
but, as a writer on this subject has well observed, “ the root 
of scarcity is not a scarce root, but a root for a time of 
scarcity.” It was first introduced into this country from 
Switzerland about the year 1785 or 1786, and, as Mr. Newby 
writes, “ this invaluable production may now be found in 
almost every civilised nation in the world where the climate 
is sufficiently temperate for its growth.” There are two 
principal varieties cultivated in this country, viz., the long or 
oblong and the globe, the former being the best adapted to 
