_Araceæ_--The arums, of which the jack-in-the-pulpit is our best-known native representative. They are nearly always herbs, often of giant size, and the great majority are found in the tropical regions. Flowers very minute, crowded together on a central column (the spadix), and this often surrounded or having at its base a leaflike appendage (the spathe). Calamus root and the skunk cabbage are also native representatives. About 105 genera and over 900 species. _Liliaceæ_--The lily and related plants, noted above. _Smilaceæ_--Smilax. Mostly prickly vines; our native kinds often called cat briers. Sarsaparilla comes from at least four species of _Smilax_. Three genera and about 300 species, mostly natives of tropical, but a few of temperate regions. _Amaryllidaceæ_--The amaryllis family, noted chiefly for the sisal fiber that comes from a species of _Agave_, which is one of the many different kinds of century plant. The family has usually capsular fruits and black seeds, and the narcissus and amaryllis of our gardens are well-known members. About 70 genera and 800 species from tropical and warm countries; a few in temperate regions, mostly herbs. _Iridaceæ_--The iris, the source of orris root, and containing some our most beautiful garden plants, the blue-eyed grass of fields, and over 50 genera and 100 species are found in this family. Nearly throughout the world, and nearly all herbs. _Musaceæ_--The banana and traveler’s-tree. Giant herbs, in the banana having the largest leaves known, frequently twelve feet long and two wide. Natives of tropical and warm regions, and 4 genera and 75 species are known. Flowers often very irregular, and in _Strelitzia_ gorgeous. _Orchidaceæ_--The orchids, already noted. While there are many thousands of plants contained in these monocotyledonous families and in the others not mentioned here, they make up only about one-third of the total number of different kinds of plants known in the world. But in grasses and sedges, in the rushes and a few other families, the number of individuals is greater than in probably any other plant family. DICOTYLEDONOUS PLANT FAMILIES All the great bulk of the flowering plants not included in the monocotyledons or the gymnosperms belong to about two hundred plant families that are included in the dicotyledons. In all of them the seed sends up two seed leaves, there are generally netted-veined leaves and the parts of the flower are in fours or fives or multiples of these numbers. In such a large aggregation of plant families there are three well-marked divisions, namely, those that bear no petals or sepals, those that do bear them and where they are separated to form individual sepals or petals, and those where the petals are united to form some sort of a tubular or at least connected corolla. These divisions are perhaps best shown thus: