28 
STUDY OF BOTANY. 
flowers, and the whole is always of one colour, generally yellow, as in 
the dandelion. 
Section 2d,—Comprehends the fiosculous flowers, or such as are 
composed of florets only ; these are generally of one flower, as in the 
everlasting flowers. 
Section 3rd.—Called radiate, and composed of both of these, so 
arranged that the florets occupy the disk, and the semi-florets the ray, 
as in the daisy. To form ail idea of a compound flower, let us take 
the common clover. Seeing so many little flowers assembled, we 
might be tempted to take the whole for a compound flower, but we 
should be mistaken, in supposing that an assemblage of many little 
flowers constitutes a compound one. Whereas one or two parts of 
the fructification must be common to them all, as in the compound 
flower, and as one will have its own separately, as in the clover, two 
parts are the calyx and recepticle. The group of flowers in the clo¬ 
ver head seems at first, to be placed upon a sort of calyx, but remove 
this a little and it will be seen, that it does not belong to the flower, 
but to the foliage, being fastened to the pedicle. So that this suppo¬ 
sed compound flower is only an assemblage of papilionaceous flowers, 
each of which has its distinct calyx, and consequently" it is an aggre¬ 
gate or capitate flower. This then is the most simple and natural de¬ 
ception we can give of this numerous tribe, and the three sections into 
which it is divided. I now come to the structure of the fructification. 
A Floret is a monopetalous flower, regular with the corolla divided 
into four or five parts, five filaments fastened to the tube of the 
corolla, united at top into a round little tube which surrounds the 
pistil, this tube being the anthera united circularly into one body. 
The pistil has the style generally longer than the floret, above which 
it rises through the tube formed by the anthers. It is most frequently 
terminated at top by a forked stigma, the two curling horns of which 
are very visible. The pistil does not rest upon the receptacle any¬ 
more than the floret, but both upon the germ serving as a base, and 
grows and lengthens as the florets wither, becoming in time a longish 
seed, and remaining fastened to the receptacle till it is ripe. One of 
the most common forms of the calvx is the imbricate or tilled, or 
that which is made up of several rows of leaves, lying over each 
other like tiles on the roof of an house, as in the artichoke. The 
most essential part of a compound flower is the receptacle, upon which 
are placed, first the florets, and then the seeds, which succeed them. 
This part, which forms a disk of some extent, makes the centre of 
the calyx, as in the dandelion. The calyx is divided into several 
parts down to the base, that it may close, open again, and turn back, 
as it does during the progress of the fructification. 
