Excerpt from Botany, Principles and Problems

The present volume, an outgrowth Of experience in presenting to college freshmen a course in elementary botany, endeavors to set forth somewhat briefly and concisely the more important facts concerning the morphology, physiology and classification of plants, and to provide a body Of problem material which may be of assistance in stimulating thought and in promoting class discussion.

The consideration of structure and function in the earlier portions of the book is confined mainly to the seed plants, and the distinctive characteristics Of the other members of the plant kingdom are discussed in the last five chapters. Should the course be too brief to take up these groups in detail, Chapter XIII, which deals with the main events in the history of the plant kingdom and the important features of its various divisions, may perhaps be used to give the student an idea of the kingdom as a whole. In view Of the importance of the soil in the life Of plants, and in order to emphasize the fact that living things cannot be understood without a knowledge of their environment, an early chapter is devoted entirely to the soil itself. The increased interest in matters pertaining to inheritance has war ranted a special chapter on heredity and variation; and a chapter is also devoted to organic evolution, emphasizing its botanical aspects. The chapters have been so written as to be separately understandable and may readily be taken up in some other order than that in which thev are here presented. The text is not primarily designed for agricultural students but many of the questions naturally involve a practical application of botanical principles and will perhaps commend themselves especially to those whose interest in botany is chiefly agricultural.

About the Publisher

Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com

This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.