Break these off and plant them in soil and you have a number of new
plants. If you can get the material, repeat this experiment with roots
of horse-radish, raspberry, blackberry or dahlia. From this we see
that it is the work of some roots to produce new plants. This function
of roots is made use of in propagating or obtaining new plants of the
sweet potato, horse-radish, blackberry, raspberry, dahlia and other
plants.

[Illustration: FIG. 4.
To show that plant-roots take water from the soil, the plants in _A_
are suffering from thirst. _B_ has sufficient water.]

[Illustration: FIG. 5.
To show that plant roots take food from the soil. Both boxes were
planted at the same time.]

[Illustration: FIG. 6.
A radish root, from which the stored food has been used to help
produce a crop of seeds. Notice the spindle shaded seed-vessels.]

[Illustration: FIG. 7.
A sweet-potato root producing new plants.]

We have now learned five important things that roots do for plants,
namely:

Roots hold plants firmly in place.

They absorb water from the soil for the plants.