Flowers and Their Friends

How flowers and insects came to need each other, explained to children by a teacher who refused to talk down — “it would be very stupid indeed to try to read a book written in Arabic,” she begins, so look up every word you don't know.

Skin Cells

5 pages in this part of Flowers and Their Friends.

Skin Cells

SKIN covers over and protects what is underneath. It is thin compared with what it covers, but it is important, as we discover when we lose…

Skin Cells: Sometimes

On the side of a regular skin cell the protoplasm builds a small cell; this grows long and divides and makes two; these may again divide…

Skin Cells: Prickles

Prickles and some kinds of hairs and scales protect the outside of the plant from animals. When the animals bite the plant, these things…

Skin Cells: Glands

These glands are merely cells which take certain things from the sap and pour them out on the outside of the plant. Glands secrete their…

Skin Cells: Bayberry

Some plants secrete wax which covers leaves or stems or fruits. Bayberry berries are covered with white wax, of which fragrant candles can…

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