Ar first sight, a China Aster appears to be composed of several flat narrow petals, ranged in a circle of diverging rays round a button-like centre consisting of a great number of yellow dots (Plate III. Fig. 1.) But if we pull out all those petals and yellow dots, we shall find that what we thought were flat narrow petals only, are really little flowers or florets, the blossom of each being composed of one long petal, in shape somewhat like a spear with a blunt point. This petal forms a very short tube at

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the base, through which the pistil rises from the top of a little egg-shaped seed that is crowned with a ring of silky white hairs, called Pappus. (Fig. 2.) There are no stamens in the flowers of the circumference in this plant. What we mistook for yellow dots are, in reality, beautiful little flowers or florets, each blossom being composed of one petal with five divisions in the border, and not unlike a funnel in shape. There are five stamens, and the anthers are united side by side in such a manner as to form a cylinder, through which the pistil rises from the little egg-shaped seed below, crowned, like those of the circumference florets, with fine soft white hairs. (Fig. 3.)

Flowers that consist of a number of florets collected together into a head, and surrounded by a sort of general calyx, the whole having the appearance of a single flower, like our China Aster, are said to be Composite. The plants that bear such flowers form the natural family of Composite plants. The calyx peculiar to this family is called an Involúcrum, a Latin word, from involvo to wrap up, and which means a covering or case.

Composite flowers are all so far alike, that the family has a very distinct natural character, as

you may see by comparing the China Aster with Marigolds, Sunflowers, and Daisies. You must always take care to gather a Daisy before sunset and on a fine day, for it opens every morning to the rising sun, and shuts itself up at the approach of rain, and every evening when the sun declines, as if to take its rest. Its name Daisy, Day's Eye, or the eye of day, comes from this habit of early rising.

The structure of the involucrum and the disposition of the hairs and chaff-like little scales that accompany the seeds, are of great importance in enabling us to distinguish composite plants from each other amongst themselves, but the union of the anthers into the form of a cylinder is the great distinction of the Composite family, because that does not exist in any other plants. There are some flowers of which the general appearance might naturally lead us to imagine that they were members of this family; the Scabious and Teasal for instance, for they too are composed of a number of small florets collected into a head, which has the appearance of a single flower, but in neither of them does the union of the anthers in the form of a cylinder exist.

In some composite plants the involucrum is composed of a single row of leaves or scales; in others there are two rows, and in others again the scales overlap one another alternately, and in a perfectly symmetrical manner, as we see them in the common Artichoke, which is a composite plant. In many instances the involucrum opens as if to make room at the right time for the florets to expand, and then, when the petals have fallen off, it again closes, apparently in order to protect the young seeds; but as the seeds ripen and increase in size, it re-opens to give them space; and in some plants it turns entirely back to let them escape. The Coltsfoot and Dandelion are in this condition when we see their heads covered with light Down.

The seeds in several of the species are very remarkable; they are invariably placed below the blossom, and there is never more than one to each floret. In several plants they are topped with a most beautiful down, consisting of a number of spokes or rays; the spokes themselves, too, are sometimes branched or feathered, and in some plants-in the Dandelion, for example-an entire crown or wheel, formed of the branches of the down, is fixed upon a sort of stem or pillar, which is itself attached