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THE

LIFE OF A TREE;

BEING A
HISTORY OF THE PHENOMENA OF VEGETATION

FROM THE

SEED TO THE DEATH OF THE PLANT.

FUBLISHED UNDER THE DIRECTION OF THE
COMMITTEE OF GENERAL LITERATURE AND EDUCATION,
APPOINTED BY THE SOCIETY FOR PROMOTING
CHRISTIAN ENOWLEDGE,

LONDON:

PRINTED FOR THE
SOCIETY FOR PROMOTING CHRISTIAN KNOWLEDGE:
a

SOLD AT THE DEPOSITORY,
GREAT QUEEN-STREET, LINCOLN’S-INN FIELDS, AND 4, ROYAL EXCHANGE:

AND BY ALL BOOKSELLERS.

1849.

LONDON
Printed by S&S. & J.BenrLey and Henry Fiery,
Bangor House, Shoe Lane.

CONTENTS.

CHAPTER I.

THE INFANCY OF THE PLANT.

PAGE

The Birth-place of the Plant.—The Coco-nut.—The Water-
nut.—Rice.—Corn.—Influence of Water, Air, and Heat.—Effect
of boiling on Seeds.—Sleep of Seeds.—Sixteen hundred years’
sleep of some Raspberry Seeds\—Mummy-wheat —The Man-
grove.—Sailor’s Sea-garden.—Experiments on Seeds.—The
young Plant.—Vegetable tissue under the Microscope.— Minute
cells: their office.—Chemical nature of Seeds.— Malting.—Ger-
mination.—Seeds want Air.—Mosses.—Fungi.— Ferns.—Sea-
weeds.—Red Snow.—Viviparous Plants.—Art of making Trees
out of Leaves.—Simplicity of the means employed in quickening
Seeds into life.

ww

CHAPTER II.

THE YOUTH OF THE TREE.

Beauty of youth.— Formation of woody fibre. — Concentric
rings.—Preparations for Winter.— The first year ended.—In-

vi CONTENTS.

PAGE
fluence of Spring.—Flow of Sap.—Direction of the Currentsx—

Force of Circulation-—Experiments of Dr. Hales.—Endosmose.
—Value of Sap.—Toddy.—The spring of the Desert—Milk-sap.
—Caoutchouc.—W oorari poison.—Vegetable milk.—Cow-tree.
—Structure or a Leaf.— Singular leaves in Australia.— The
heap of Onions.—Green colour of Plants. —Influence of Light.—
Curious effects of Light on some Plants.—Experiments of Mr.
R. Hunt.— Influence of Coloured Light.—Source of wood: ex-
periments on it.— From Air.—Composition of Air.—Carbonic
Acid.— Experiment on a sprig of mint.—Function of Leaves.—
Sleep of Plants.—Carbonic Acid in the Air.—Purifying influence
of Plants.—Mushroom tribe.—Singular properties of.—Change
and Fall of the Leaf. . . : : A . 43

CHAPTER III.

THE ADULT TREE.

Section of the Stem.—Exogenous and Endogenous Trees. —
Rings represent years.—The Food of Plants.—Source of Nitro-
gen. —Ammonia.— Rain.—Alkalis.— Fern-balls.— Manures.—
Liebig’s discoveries.—Geography of Plants. —Visit to a Salt-dis-
trict.—Curious anecdote of a Hay-stack.—Silex in Plants.—
Tabasheer.— Flowering-time of the Tree.—Effects of Light
on colour of Flowers. —The Chameleon-flower.— Odour of
Flowers.—Flowers expanding at Night.—The Sleep of Plants.—

—Linneus and his gardener.— Flower-clock.—Irritability of

CONTENTS.

Plants. — Sensitive-plant. —“ How-d’-ye-do”-plant.— The Fly-
trap. — The Common Berberry.— The Dancing-plant.— Have
Plants instinct ?—Singular action of the Screw-pine.—Remark-
able anecdote of a Tree.—Effect of Poisons on Plants.—Mr.
Ward’s miniature Conservatories.—Temperature of Plants.—
Heat observed in Flowers.—Cuckoo-pint.—Cause of Heat. —Lu-
minosity of Plants.—Fungi.—Structure of a Flower.—Pollen.—
The Date-famine.—The Apple-feast—The Fruit—Ripening of
—Rotting of—Preservation of.— Events of Autumn in the Tree.
—Bread from Bark.—Sago.

CHAPTER IV.

THE OLD AGE OF THE TREE.

Aspect of Old Age.—Hollow of the Trunk: explanation of it.
—Strength even though hollow.—Age of the Tree.—Difference
between Exogens and Endogens.—Extreme Old Age of some
Trees. —Banquet-chamber in a Plane-tree.—The great Lime-tree
of Neustadt.—Immense Dining-table.—Chestnut of the Hundred
Horses.—Old Yew-trees.—The Fortingal Yew.—The Baobab.—
Cedars of JLebanon.—The Sycamore.— Great Cypress near
Oaxaca. — Immense Locust-trees. —Dragon-tree of Teneriffe.
—Life of the Braburn Yew-tree.—The Cubbeer burr.—Giant
Sycamores in America.—One turned into a Shop.—Fruit in
old age.

vil

PAGE

99

Vill CONTENTS.

CHAPTER V.
THE DEATH OF THE TREE.

Effect of a Storm.—Causes which produced it.—Internal decay.
—Carriage and four driven through a Tree.—Time of Death in
Plants.—Fungous Plants. —Annuals,—Biennials.— Perennials.—
Causes of Death.—Diseases of Plants:—Honey-dew.—Potato-
disease.—Parasite Plants.—The “ Rust.’’—Insect-attacks.— Dry
rot. — Rotting under Water. — Formation of Coal.— Common
decay.—Death of the Tree—The End.

PAGE

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A TREE.

THE INFANCY OF

THE

Peek OF A TREE,

CHAPTER I.
THE INFANCY OF A PLANT.

WuenreE shall we place the cradle of vegetable
life? Shall I take the reader to the dim shades
of a Brazilian wood, and, by the side of one of
those broad rivers which roll their life-teeming
waters steadily down through thousands of miles
of vegetable luxuriance, point to the ripe berry
just dropped into the soft mud, and almost while
we are looking on, coming to life, and shooting up
into a great plant? Shall I take him to some
palm-crowned isle, and, standing on a coral-
reef, bid him watch the long swell of the great
Pacific, carrying on its crest a solitary coco-nut,

4, LIFE OF A TREE.

leave it on the white shore and retire again; while
from the one end of the sea-washed fruit pre-
sently peeps out a lusty shoot,—and ere our next
visit, behold! a great tree, itself laden with fruit,
occupying its place? Or shall we travel to the
parched Sahara, and mark that tumbling wind-
tossed ball, like dried parchment, which, wandering
hither and thither at the will of the hot and fit-
ful wind, alights at length on a spot where some
sweet drops of refreshing moisture ooze up through
the thirsting soil; and, while the hour remains, see
it unfold its horny bosom, and jut out buds and
flowers? Or hence take the wind’s wings and
seek the snow-covered, ice-bound plains of the
North, and here behold—are they spots of blood ?
—here and there, far as the eye can reach, deep
crimson stains lie on the pale surface. Has some
giant animal received his death-wound, and, in
his painful staggerings to his lair to die, let fall
a thousand drops of blood? Whence come these
gory marks, so thickly scattered as if the sky
itself, deep, clear, and cold as it is, had been
weeping tears of blood? A handful of the
crimsoned snow answers the question, and by
the microscope informs us that the stain is due

THE BIRTH-PLACE OF THE SEED. 5

to the presence of a multitude of minute cells,
which, bursting, scatter around more cells, and
these more again. This is a plant; and here
too, if we choose, might we watch the birth of
vegetable life.

Since then, the birth-place of the seed is so
various, since it is the order of Nature and in-
deed the custom of man, to assign differences of
locality, and differences of external conditions, to
the early homes of vegetables, we may find in-
teresting matter for a little thought in examining
these circumstances in brief, ere we look at life’s
beginnings in the seed itself. We may look
upon the earth as a great garden, in the countless
plots of which millions of plants and trees live
and die in a variety of conditions, all of which
deserve our attention, although only a few, and
these very imperfectly, can obtain room in this
little work. In an ordinary flower-garden it is
well known that different seeds demand different
treatment : some may be cast upon the surface,
and left to take their course; others must be
watched, nurtured, and tended with the utmost
care; some require heat, others do not; and some
require much moisture, while others will be con-

6 LIFE OF A TREE.

tent with very little. So is it in the wide gar-
den of the world: the constitution of plants
varies, and their conditions of coming into
existence vary also.

Let us, then, cast one glance abroad. _We are
in Ceylon. The blue and cloudless air is full of
warm odours, and the burning sun drives us to the
shelter of the coco-palm groves. Here comes a
native with a rude kind of spade in his hand, and
a bag containing salt together with a coco-nut in
the other.* Digging about a foot down into the
soil a hole sufficiently large to accommodate the
nut, he sprinkles a little salt over it, then shovels
in the earth, and setting a mark over the place
leaves it. By-and-by the soil cracks, and the
young plant rears its head aloft, and in time takes
its place with the noblest of those around.—Now
we are in Egypt. In the dim horizon see the
pointed peak of the pyramids standing against the
sky; while between them and Cairo rolls a sea
of fertile land, level and smooth; and the great
Nile in the distance is seen winding its lazy
Jength along in a serpentine direction toward the
sea. The inundation is at an end; the retiring

* See the Frontispiece to this Chapter.

THE WATER-NUT. r |

waters have left the whole surface of the country
in the condition of a most prolific seed-bed. The
Egyptian comes and casts his seed-corn upon the
rich compost thus provided for him by the won-
derful river; soon, fortified by the warm air and
all-day-shining sun, the young plant appears; and
but a little while need elapse before we behold
the valley standing thick with corn.

Let us turn from hence to the still waters of the
Imperial Canal in China. Here, at morning-time,
the whole surface of the water appears covered
with a dense carpet of green. ‘This effect is
produced by the leaves of the water-nut (Zrapa
bicornis), the seeds of which were some time
since committed to the waves by the Chinese
cultivators. As the sun rises high the fair white
flowers open, and the floating carpet now be-
comes white, interspersed here and there with
the tulip-shaped, lovely pink blossoms of the
lotus flower. After a few months the nut is ripe,
and supplies millions of human beings with
sustenance. Here wasa plant born in the waves!

Look now at yonder broad Indian plain cover-
ed with water. See that pair of bullocks drag-
ing a rude plough behind them, whose share

8 LIFE OF A TREE.

is buried below the surface of the water, while
they and the holder of the plough wade ankle-
deep along their toilsome course. Then watch
who follows,—one with a number of little balls
of earth, out of which peeps a young plant.
These are dropped in, the bread is cast upon the
waters, and after many days a waving rice-field
occupies the place of the formerly unclothed
plain.

But nearer home. It is seed-time, and Old
England’s broad bosom is being ploughed into
many a furrow. Along the upland see the pair
of well-fed horses steadily pulling the iron
plough held by the whistling ploughman, so
is the seed-bed laid open. Then see the sower
with his basket of corn-seed flinging abroad the
precious grain; while the harrow follows him,
and gently covers in the seed, imbedding it an
inch or two in the soil. Winter follows the steps
of the sower, and puts its ice-lock on the ground.
But in time the dreary months pass by, the
“winter is past, the rain is over and gone, the
flowers appear on the earth,” the corn blades rise
from the brown bosom of the field, the summer’s
sun gilds the heavy ear with its own golden tint,

WATER—AIR—HEAT. 9

and the still evenings of autumn see the laden
wagons carry them to the barn.

Thus variously is the seed sown, and in these
different and opposite circumstances does plant-
life begin.

Now, while it is true that these circumstances
are all very different from one another, it is also
true that, if we take a little pains to think over
them, the differences will not appear as great
as they now do. What we require to know is,
what is requisite, as far as outward influences
are concerned, to start life in the seed. In all
the examples mentioned the essential conditions
exist, but are greatly modified: nevertheless
they exist, and by virtue of their presence the
seed begins to live.

These conditions are very simple and easy to
be understood; and, as they are only three in
number, they deserve to be remembered. They
are :—first, a sufficiency of moisture; second,
a sufficiency of air; and third, a sufficiency of
heat. Thus Water, Air, and Heat, are abso-
lutely necessary to a seed before it can begin to
live. And if the reader will glance back over the
various examples of seed-sowing we have enu-

10 LIFE OF A TREE.

merated, and reflect upon them, he will certainly
find in all that these three conditions exist :—
yes even in the Arctic Regions there is at proper
seasons enough heat, moisture, and air for a red-
snow plant to live; although it is necessary to
mention that its little cells do not properly belong
to the class of seeds, and are not so dependent on
these external circumstances.

Up to this point we have spoken of the life
of a seed as if it only commenced at the time
when the first appearance of the little root and
the young leaves occurs. But it is interest-
ing to remember, that seeds are actually alive,
strictly speaking, before they are committed to
the earth; and some very curious particulars
belong to this part of vegetable history. In
proof of this, let the reader take a handful of
wheat and put it into boiling water for a few
minutes ; then let it be taken out and sown in
the earth. They will never spring up; the seeds
have been killed.

Some interesting experiments on this subject
were made by Messrs. Edwards and Colin. They
found that at a degree of heat (125° Fahrenheit’s
thermometer) which could be borne by the hand

SEEDS KILLED BY BOILING WATER. 11

without inconvenience, the tender seeds of
barley, kidney-beans, and flax, were killed. At
twenty degrees more heat the seeds of wheat
were killed, and in still hotter water the death
took place almost immediately. Extreme cold is
equally destructive to seeds of many kinds, though
less so to those just named. From this cause
many a florist in England has experienced deep
disappointment, in receiving valuable packages
of seeds from India, which have travelled by the
sea-route. The tender seeds of that burning
climate die in consequence of their exposure to
great extremes of heat and cold before they can
arrive in England. Thus, while we may justly
say that the seed slumbers so long as it is in
that condition under ordinary circumstances, the
sleep is not death, and the beautifully organised
mass is only waiting for the voice of Spring,
and the scent of water, to put forth its leaves and
awake to vigorous existence.

The question, How long may a seed remain in
this state of sleep without passing into that of
complete death? is one which must receive very
variable answers. Certainly the time is limited,
but the limits differ in different plants: in

12 LIFE OF A TREE.

some, death occurs in a few years; but in the
following wonderful instances seeds have attained
a greater age than twice the life of the oldest
man that ever lived. Dr. Lindley says:— 1
have before me three plants of raspberries, which
have been raised in the garden of the Horti-
cultural Society from seeds taken from the
stomach of a man, whose skeleton was found
thirty feet below the surface of the earth, at the
bottom of a barrow * which was opened near
Dorchester. He had been buried with some
coins of the Emperor Hadrian, and it is therefore
probable that the seeds were sixteen or seven-
een hundred years old!” Yet, on being planted,
and carefully tended, they came to life and bare
fruit.

A more remarkable anecdote of the vitality of
seeds is related. In the folds of cloth which
the ancient Egyptians used to wrap round the
bodies of their dead after embalming them, a few
grains of wheat were found by an Egyptian
traveller. The age of the mummy, as their em-
balmed body is called, was probably at least
from two to three thousand years! This gentle-

* A barrow is an ancient form of hollow underground tomb.

MUMMY WHEAT. 13

man took care of the seeds, and committed them
to the charge of an experienced horticulturist,
who planted them. To the amazement of both
parties, the seeds proved to be alive; and in a
little while, strong, healthy plants of Egyptian
corn made their appearance above the soil.
These, in due time, ripened, and bare fruit abun-
dantly. The seeds were preserved, and in due
time sown, and these also produced healthy
plants, and an abundant supply of more seed-
corn. Ultimately, enough was obtained to
make the seeds an article of sale ; and the reader
can at this day, if he pleases, purchase for a
trifle the descendants of seeds which were, at
the very least, two thousand years old before they
were committed to the soil. This wheat, from
its interesting origin, is called “‘ Mummy wheat.”

What a wonderful subject for thought is this!
A sleep of two thousand years! And how re-
markably does it illustrate the wisdom and pro-
vidence of God, who has endowed seeds with this
length of vitality, to guard against their ever
becoming lost to man, as they would soon be if
all were not able to endure a life of slumber
beyond a year or two.

14 LIFE OF A TREE.

The seed, in this condition, presents us with a
problem science is not yet able satisfactorily to
resolve. We cannot tell what its life consists in,
yet we know it to be alive; we do not know
why its powers should be, as it were, hushed to
sleep, and yet still remain in it ready to come to
life when outward circumstances are favourable.
Neither can we say why, after a certain lapse of
time, these powers disappear, and the seed be-
comes really and truly dead. All this is full of
mystery, even to the wisest of men; nor is it
probable the difficulties will ever be cleared up by
the efforts of human philosophy. ‘The truth is,
in this and in many other cases, “‘ now, we know
only in part ;” in another life we shall know ad.

But now we are to suppose the sleep is about
to be broken; Nature’s husbandmen, the birds,
the beasts, and the far-circulating winds, or the
human husbandman, have buried the seed in the
soft bosom of the earth. The evening dew and
morning shower come down, and give to its bed
the proper supply of moisture; the warm sun-
beam gently heats the earth; and the air creeps
in at the chinks, and gives the proper stimulus to
the awakening plant. Thus the three essential

~

THE MANGROVE. 15

points are gained, and under the influence of them
the seed commences that wonderful chain of
living actions, which are only to cease when the
tree becomes dust again.

Sometimes, indeed, the seed need not be first
buried in earth before it can awake to life, and
become a new and vigorous plant. The most
curious instance of this exception to the general
rule is in the case of the mangrove, a tree grow-
ing exclusively in tropical countries. These
trees delight to grow in the soft, oozy mud, where
a river enters the sea, and to have their roots
continually immersed in the wet and pestiferous
waters, half fresh and half salt. If they were to
drop their seeds as other trees do, they would
fall upon the surface of the waves, and be carried
away and lost. But it has been otherwise or-
dered. ‘The seed begins to grow here before it
leaves its parent’s breast, and puts out a long
delicate root, which lengthens downward until
it has reached the mud below; here it strikes
root, and as soon as it is strong enough to pro-
vide its own living, its connection with the
parent-stem is broken off, and it becomes a
vigorous tree.

16 LIFE OF A TREE.

Ordinarily, however, the imbedding in the soil
is necessary for the growth of the seed, although
it is by no means essential, since many seeds, if
merely moistened with a little water, and kept
in the dark, and in a room of moderate warmth,
will begin to sprout. But they rapidly die if
kept out of the earth for any length of time after
this process has once begun. Probably every
one has heard of the sailor’s mustard-and-cress
apparatus. Those who have not may be in-
formed that it is simply a worsted stocking and
a bottle: the seeds are scattered inside the stock-
ing, which is kept extended on the bottle and
constantly wetted; and in a few days a dish of
salad is produced by this odd miniature garden!
And a little modification of this idea will enable
the reader to follow us in our description of what
next takes place. Let him construct the follow-
ing simple contrivance :—procuring a piece of
perforated zinc with fine holes, and cutting it
into a triangular form, let each corner of the
triangle be stuck into a flat piece of cork; place
this in a tumbler of water, and it will float on its
surface at the same time that the zinc is kept
constantly half-covered with water. Now sprin-

THE BEGINNING OF LIFE. 1%

kle upon the perforated plate a few mustard-
seeds, and cover the whole with a small flower-
pot. In about a day, or a day and a half, life
has evidently begun, and
its first stages may be
watched, and will form a
most interesting amuse-

ment. The accompany-
ing figure contains a view of the whole of this
simple apparatus.

Placed in the circumstances we have described,
the seed begins to swell, and becomes sensibly
softer than before: this arises from its imbibing
moisture from surrounding objects, or, if half
immersed in water, from that fluid itself. It
swells more and more until its outer coats split
open, and the tiny head of the young plant is seen
peeping forth as a little yellowish white portion
at one end of the seed. ‘This increases in length
and in size, and by-and-by a sharp glance will
detect the appearance of another little portion,
which also lengthens, and while the other in-
variably strikes upwards, the latter as invariably
strikes in the opposite direction, or downwards.
It is easy to guess now which portions of a plant

C

18 LIFE OF A TREE.

these two minute projections represent — the
up-tending one is the future stem, and the de-
scending one is the future root. The
appearance of the seed with its two
new appendages at this time may be
thus represented. The terms used by
botanists in speaking of the young stem
crowing 2#2d young root are, respectively, the
seeD. plumule and the radicle. Every day adds
strength to the young plant. Its radicle goes deeper
into the nurturing earth, and its little plumule
struggles up steadily and bravely through the dark
over-head, as though impatient to respond to the
call which the busy world above was making for its
appearance. Looking now upon the earth’s sur-
face in the spot where a long while since we set
the seed, we find it swelled and beginning to
heave up and crack. If a little of it is gently
removed, behold! the young plant is rising up,
and in another day it has over-topped the soil,
A pair of minute leaves become now visible;
these extend themselves, spread out into the
fresh air, and welcome the drops of rain, while
the stem of the plant becomes stronger and
stronger, and grows both thick and tall. The

THE DUTY OF THE ROOT. 19

plant also, from being yellow or white, becomes of
a most refreshing green.

Nor is the root idle. It pokes its unlighted
way through the smallest crevices of the soil.
It absorbs the water which flows down there,
containing much food for plants in solution; and
so soon as the leaves above begin to do their
duties, to maintain the health and life of the
plant, the root puts out a number of little roots,
which strike off at right angles, and set out all
in search of more food for the stem and leaves,
which, since they are now growing very fast,
they call for most imperiously. The roots thus
extend in every direction, until they fill the
earth below with a mass of the most delicate
and beautifully white filaments, like fine threads.
By this time the plant has risen several inches
above the earth, and is daily putting forth fresh
leaves, and increasing both in elegance and in
stature and diameter. It now also fulfils all the
functions of a perfect plant.

How has all this train of beautiful events taken
place? There are two answers to this ques-
tion, one of which we shall call the anatomical,
and the other the chemical. Both are of the

20 LIFE OF A TREE.

highest interest; let us, therefore, glance at the
first before speaking more in detail upon the
second.

Has the reader followed our recommendation,
and watched the growth of the mustard-seed ?
and has the question never arisen in his mind,
how does this plant grow? how does it become
larger and larger, and thus put out shoots which,
respectively, seek the light, and bury themselves
in the soil? Surely these questions deserve an
answer, 1f one can be given. The question can
be to some extent satisfactorily answered, for
the microscope has shed its light upon the
subject. By its means, then, we have ascer-
tained the following facts; the merit of many of
which is chiefiy due to the celebrated botanist
Dr. Schleiden.

By means of a very sharp razor we are able
to cut off a thin morsel from the seed; and, on
looking at this with a good microscope, we find
it all made up of cells, looking like so much
delicate and beautiful lace-work. Now, these
little cells are every one of them little bladders,
made of vegetable tissue for their sides, and
containing inside a number of grains of starch

THE CELLS OF THE PLANT. |

and other substances, as may be seen by the
accompanying figure. These cells possess some
singular properties. They are able
to produce other cells like them-
selves, and these may produce 7
others again, and so on infinitely. pranz-ceLis
What now would follow from this (/7fied).
fact? Suppose a single cell produced five more,
and each of these five, and so on, yet that all
stuck together into one mass, the result would be
that the mass would increase in size,—in other
words, it would grow.

This is just what takes place in the seed when
it grows. The little cells we see figured above,
become the parents of a great many more of the
same kind. ‘This takes place chiefly at that part
of the seed where the little plumule and radicle
are found: thus we see that, by more and more
cells being born, the plumule grows, and the same
with the radicle. Hence we might, for the sake
of clearness, liken the growth of the stem of a
plant to the building of a chimney: by adding
brick after brick, it becomes taller and taller; and
if, while we added bricks to the top, we also
added a brick or two now and then to the sides,

De, LIFE OF A TREE.

it would become thicker and thicker. So it is
in the plant from the beginning to the end of
its existence. It is always growing tall and stout,
by fresh cells of different kinds being added to
it, at the top for the stem, at the bottom for the
root, and at the sides for the branches. Thus
we may say that a whole tree is a mass of little
vegetable cells, put together in different ways,
and of different kinds as to what they contain
inside, &c. Methinks I hear one say,—What!
is wood made up of cells? are leaves, and flowers,
and fruit, all cells! All are cells, — but con-
taining various different ingredients, and shaped
in various different ways, as they have different
and perhaps opposite duties to fulfil in the great
tree to which they belong.

Yet more wonderful is the fact, that all these
minute cells are so many chemical laboratories, in
which the most remarkable changes take place.
Here, for example, in these little cells is pre-
pared the food which is to nourish and sustain
the lives of men, beasts, and birds. Here, also,
all our pleasant odours are produced, before the
evening air, laden with dew, has snatched them
from the flower; strong and potent drugs to

THE CHEMISTRY OF GROWTH. 93

relieve human suffering, or to heal bodily diseases,
are also made here. Colours bright as the rain-
bow, and more pure in their tint than any that
human art can compose, are likewise formed and
locked up here, whence they are often extracted
by man, to apply them to his own purposes.
They are, in fact, both the receptacles and also
the producers of every vegetable product, however
varied in its character, or strange in its properties.
As we proceed in our history of the life of a tree,
this fact should never be lost sight of,—that all
the changes and decompositions of which we shall
have to speak, take place in these little cells, each
of which, although independent of the others,
because there is no opening from one into an-
other, yet acts in beautiful harmony with the
rest.

We have now to ask the reader’s attention
to the answer which Chemistry gives when she
is asked, How does the seed come to life, and
grow into a great tree? First we may ask, What
are the components of the seed itself? When
the infinite variety of seeds is remembered, and
when we consider to what millions of different
plants they give rise, many of which are as op-

Q4. LIFE OF A TREE.

posite to each other as can be conceived possible,
is it not somewhat astonishing that in four words
we can tell the composition of them all? With-
out exception, then, all seeds are made up of
four different substances: Carbon, Hydrogen,
Oxygen, and Nitrogen,—the latter in minute
quantities. These substances do not exist sepa-
rately, but are combined together, some of them
uniting to form what we call starch; some to
form the vegetable tissue which enters into the
husk of the seed, and some to form what is called
gluten. Thus starch, vegetable tissue, and gluten
are the three components of all seeds, and they
are made up of four simple elements, which we
have just named. A little experiment will prove
the presence of these ingredients in a seed. If
the reader will procure a little of the flour out
of which brown bread is made, he will find it full
of little scales of bran, which are of a light brown
colour. By throwing it on a fine sieve, the bran
may be separated, and the flour falls through.
This bran is the outer husk of the seed, and is
composed of vegetable tissue,—thus one of the
ingredients of a seed has been found out. Now,
by mixing the sifted flour with a little water, it

COMPOSITION OF THE SEED. 25

becomes what, in the language of the kitchen, is
called dough. Taking this and working it between
the fingers under a little stream of water for some
time, at length we obtain a sticky substance like
bird-lime,—this is gluten. And if we collected
the water after washing the lump of dough in it,
we should find it quite milky, and that soon a
white powder would settle at the bottom,—this
powder is starch.* This simple and easy experi-
ment or analysis, then, tells us in unmistakable
language what enters into the composition of a
seed, so far as its first constituents are concerned;
but it would require the most profound know-
ledge of chemistry, and the most delicate and
costly apparatus to find out what these three
ingredients were made of. This has, however,
been done, and the result is given in the four
words abovementioned.

Here then is the preliminary chemistry of a
seed; let us now see what happens when we put
it in such a position as that it shall be supplied
with moisture, air, and warmth. If we go toa

* The starch sold in the shops is procured by a process similar to

this, principally from potatoes.

26 LIFE OF A TREE.

maltster’s, and get permission to look at the grain
he is making into malt, in its different states, we
shall enjoy an excellent opportunity of seeing
how the process goes on. Here it will be seen
that large masses of barley, which have previously
been moistened with water, are strewed upon a
brick-floor. The room is entirely dark, for, strange
to say, seeds will not begin to grow in the light !
as if they were sensible that they were not in
their proper place when exposed to the glare of
day; and, by means of holes cut in the walls and
door, air is admitted in sufficient quantity. The
ordinary warmth of the air is sufficient for the
purpose of causing the seed to grow.

Seeds placed in this condition, if still alive,
cannot fail shortly to manifest the fact by begin-
ning to swell and soften, and put forth the young
plants. This process is called germination. It
is, in fact, the awakening of the powers of life
in the seed, and their developement into the pro-
duction of a new and beautiful beig—the in-
fant plant. On examining the barley, Ist. it will
be found that it has absorbed or drunk in all
the moisture which was thrown upon it. On
putting the hand into the midst of the grains,

PROCESS OF MALTING. Q7

they will be found, 2nd. to be quite warm,
although no heat has been applied to them.
And if one or two are tasted, they now possess,
ord. a very agreeable sugary taste. This is all
that the maltster requires in order to prepare
the grains for becoming malt; and as he knows
that, if he permitted the process of germination
to go any further, the young plant would in
its growth consume all this sugar, he determines
now to kill the seed; and lighting a fire below
the floor, he heats it until the barley is dried
and killed. It is then malt, and is fit for brewing
into ale or porter.

Now there is a great deal of chemistry in all
this; and we hope to make it easily intelligible
to an attentive and careful reader. Water is
taken into the seed,—this is the first fact. It
serves to dissolve and soften some portion of
the ingredients of the seed, and so prepare it
to undergo a change of nature; for it is an im-
portant rule in chemistry, that any substance
when dissolved is more easily decomposed, or
made into another substance, than if solid. But
simultaneously, or nearly so, with the absorp-
tion of water, the seed also absorbs a portion

98 LIFE OF A TREE.

of oxygen gas from the air.* This, of course, we
cannot perceive by our senses; but it is a well
known fact, and is the source of the warmth felt.
In so doing, a most singular thing takes place,—
the starch becomes converted into sugar, and thus,
as sugar is easily dissolved in water, while starch
scarcely dissolves in cold water at all, the young
plant receives its first nourishment in a liquid
form. Thus we see that the sweet taste of malt
is accounted for.

We said that the sticky substance remaining
after washing “dough” in water is gluten. It
may now be asked, What becomes of this ingre-
dient of the seed when the latter begins to
germinate? This question has puzzled some
of the most eminent chemists; and although we
believe we now know what takes place more
perfectly than formerly, yet we must not deny
that it is still very obscure. It seems to be
converted into a new substance, so that, instead
of remaining insoluble in water, it is now quite
soluble, and therefore is just in that condition

* The composition of the air is as follows. Nitrogen and oxygen,

with small but vastly important traces of carbonic acid gas and
ammonia.

EXPERIMENTS IN SEEDS. 929

in which it ought to be for the wants of the
plant; for both the gluten and the starch are
the stores of food which are providentially de-
posited in the seed, and which nourish the
young plant until it is able to obtain food for
itself. Both these remarkable changes of inso-
luble into soluble substances, so beautifully con-
trived to meet the necessities of the infant plant,
are begun by absorbing water from the soil, and
oxygen gas from the air. Therefore, if we at-
tempted to make a seed grow without giving it
water and air, we should certainly not succeed.
Some remarkable experiments upon growing
seeds have been made with several interesting
results. Seeds have been placed in the receiver
of an air-pump, and by pumping out all the air
a vacuum has been obtained; but, although mois-
ture and warmth were supplied to the seeds, they
refused to shew the least inclination to ger-
minate. They have also been put into glass-
vessels, full of some other gas than pure atmo-
spheric air, such as the gas which is in soda
and other effervescent waters—carbonic acid;
and the gas with which balloons used to be
filled on account of its lightness—hydrogen. The

30 LIFE OF A TREE.

end of these experiments shewed two things:
1. That seeds will not germinate if deprived of
air;—and 2. That the air in which they germi-
nate best is that of the atmosphere: that is to
say, that man cannot by his skill make any ar-
tificial air or gas which will answer the purpose
so well as that which the Creator has made.
The knowledge of the first of these facts ex-
plains to us how it is that seeds will not grow
if buried too deep in the earth. How many a
young florist has been disappointed, after weeks
of patient watching, weeding, and watering, to
find his stocks, or his sweet-peas, or his mig-
nonette, shewing no symptoms of ‘“ coming
up’! Had he known this simple fact, he would
never have dug a hole more than half a foot
deep, and dropped his seeds in, ramming down
the heavy earth upon their heads. Hence we
find all gardening-books tell us,—many of them
perhaps without knowing the reason why, ex-
cepting from experience,—when we sow our seed,
to cover it very lightly with earth. Hence also
the farmer takes care that the furrows shall not
be too deep on the surface of his field, when the
corn is about to be committed to its nursing-

FLOWERLESS PLANTS. 51

mother the earth. This will also explain the
appearance of a number of plants on a lump of
earth which has been brought up to the surface
from a depth of several feet. The seeds were
long since imbedded in the lump, but could not
struggle into life because of the depth at which
they were buried, and the consequent exclusion
of air. Finally, this will also lead us to under-
stand the best mode of conveying seeds from
place to place. For example, it has been found
that the only way to bring many seeds from
distant regions to our own country, is to pack
them in boxes full of clay rammed hard in. In
this manner the seeds of the Mango, from the
West Indies, and those of the beautiful Araucaria
Pines from Chile, have been successfully brought
home to England.

A large number of plants, however, produce
no true seed, nor are produced by true seeds
themselves. These belong to that division of
the vegetable kingdom which contains the flower-
less plants.

Any one who has noticed the slimy, green
covering, which frequently paints our stuccoed
walls, with a dark and dirty hue, has seen plants,

32 LIFE OF A TREE.

minute though they are, but plants which never
sprang from seed. Any one, too, who has picked
up the straying sea-weed, torn by the wave from
its deep home of rock, however varied its ap-
pearance, has found another instance of a flower-
less and seedless plant. Wandering also among
the grave-stones of some old church-yard, and
picking out of the deep-graven letters some tiny
and hair-like mosses, we shall fall upon a third
variety of these plants. And upon the giant
arms of many a veteran cak, which in our forests
has braved the ‘ battle and the breeze” for cen-
turies, behold a fourth kind comes under our
notice, in the dry and shining lichens which give
it such a venerable aspect. Down in the deep
shade of the woods, where the summer brook
bathes the feet of the thickly-clustered trees,
springs another kind, the fungi; some, it is true,
not very attractive in colour, but others painted
in such delicate flushes of pink and white, as
might grace many a fair lady’s cheek. The edi-
ble mushroom belongs to the same class. The
next family of plants, the ferns, however, will
supply us with the best and most elegant illus-
trations of this peculiarity.

BEAUTY OF THE FERN-TRIBE. 30

We know nothing of the grandeur of ferns in
our own country. Few among those who pick
up their strange stems by the way-side, would

TREE FERNS,

imagine that, in warmer regions, they even ,be-
come trees, To look at the accompanying figure,

we should at first suppose these tall and elegantly
D

34 LIFE OF A TREE,

crowned trees to belong to the royal family of
the Palms, but they are true ferns ;— strange
to say, they produce no seed, and are therefore
placed by the botanist in a position very little
above Club-mosses, and the ditch-loving Horse-
tails. To the inquiry, How then do new plants
spring forth ? we must answer by turning up the
leaf of the fern, and there, without the help of
a glass, we shall perceive little cases or cells,
which contain within them a multitude of very
minute bodies, called in botanical language
spores. ‘These are really very small cells, or-
ganised in a peculiar manner, which, when placed
in favourable circumstances, begin to form new
cells, and ultimately become the perfect plant.
They are so light as to float frequently in the air,
and are thus conveyed to great distances, where,
mayhap, they are dropped, and in time grow up
and become strong plants. In all the kinds of
plants abovementioned, this method of reproduc-
tion is observed; only it varies in the beautiful
contrivances by which the tiny spores are dis-
persed abroad. In the case of the sea-weed they
are carefully wrapped up in what seems to be a
piece of jelly, and are carried by the currents of

RED-SNOW. 35

the great ocean from shore to shore, until they
stick to some favouring rock, where they begin
to grow, and in time bring forth their irregular
stems, and leaves, if we may call them such. The
remarkable plant beforementioned, the ‘ Red-
snow,’ as it is called, is produced also by little
cells of this kind.

This little plant, being of a blood-red colour,
has often been the innocent cause of much popu-
lar alarm. We frequently read, for instance, in
old books, of the occurrence of showers of blood,
and noted as demonstrating the special anger of
God against a people or district; and, in truth,
the blood-bedropped ground presented a spec-
tacle sufficiently calculated to arouse the easily
excited fears of an ignorant age. Modern science
in this, as in many other instances, has destroyed
these unreasonable apprehensions; and informs
us, as has been before mentioned, that the light
spores of the red-snow plant, wafted through the
air, and dropped on the surface of the earth,
are the cause of the marks, so long looked upon
with dismay.

We cannot tell how the early processes of life
take place in these classes of plants: they

36 LIFE OF A TREE.

have not been watched with the care bestowed
upon the germination of the seed. We may
certainly conclude thus much concerning them,—
they are of far greater simplicity than the cor-
responding phenomena in the seed. A certain
amount of moisture, and an appropriate degree
of temperature, must undoubtedly be necessary to
their developement ; beyond this, the chemistry
of the young life of the plants produced from
spores is buried in darkness. In the mature age
of some of them, as we shall presently have to
see, they exhibit a most remarkable pheno-
menon of a chemical order, and prove them-
selves the complete exceptions to the rest of the
vegetable world.

The curiosity attending the production of
plants in yet another mode, justifies its being
shortly mentioned before we conclude this chap-
ter. We were lately permitted to examine a
magnificent conservatory full of tropical plants ;
among which were some of the most elegant
and graceful of the Fern family. On looking
closely at the leaves of these plants, the most
curlous phenomenon presented itself: at their
edges were a number of young ferns, all vigor-

VIVIPAROUS PLANTS. 3o7

ously flourishing, and in all the different stages
of their growth. The botanical expression for
this strange method of reproduction is, that
the plants are Viviparous; that is, that they
bring forth their young not in the state of
seed, but as young plants: which is a very
different thing from what was mentioned of the
mangrove. In that case, the seeds were first
produced and ripened, and grew on the tree,
instead of in the soil: in this, the young plant
never was a seed; or at least, if perhaps in the
fern we might suppose that the spore ripened
as in the mangrove, many other instances exist
where no such thing as a seed or a spore
preceded the birth of the plant.

The following is a very remarkable and beau-
tifui experiment. If a leaf of the plant called
Bryophyllum Calycinum, a relative of the house-
leek family, is placed upon a little bed of moist
soil and carefully watched, it will not fade and
die as most leaves do in a similar position, but
will continue fresh and green, and manifestly
alive and well; by-and-by its edges begin to
swell, and in a little time, to the amazement
of the beholder, he finds a number of minute

38 LIFE OF A TREE.

young plants putting out their tiny leaves in
this singular position, and becoming strong and
large. If, again, we break a portion of a leaf
of the Gesneria, it puts out, says Dr. Schleiden,
a new young plant in about a week: the same
takes place in several other plants. Sometimes,
indeed, the leaf itself will grow when planted
and set in the soil favourable to it. Orange-
trees have been grown in this way; and it is
well known that, in the middle ages, a travelling
florist, named Mirandola, went about teaching
“the art of making trees out of leaves.” It
may be added also, that the little organs we call
“buds” occasionally grow, and become perfect
plants even in nature.

In these cases nothing worthy of remark exists,
as to the chemical nature of the vital processes
of the young plants, to justify their being con-
sidered separately from the notice we purpose
bestowing upon this subject in the next chap-
ter.

Such then is the infancy of vegetation :—
passed in various regions and under circum-
stances as extreme to one another as the frozen
north, and torrid zone. Climate makes no differ-

SIMPLICITY OF CONDITIONS OF GROWTH. 39

ence in the unvarying chain of processes which
characterize it. The seed calls for heat, mois-
ture, and air, all the world over, before it can
live to become a plant.* This is one of those
grand simplicities of Creating Wisdom, which fill
us far more with wonder and admiration than
the most complicated and ingenious effort of
human skill. Had the task been given to man
to accomplish, what an infinity of altering
circumstances and forces would he not have
thought necessary, to effect the germination
of different seeds placed in the most opposite
conditions! In the hands of the Creator of
the worlds around and above us, see how a
few and simple principles do all, and do all
well—so that, while ages roll on, no part of
the world once clothed with plants, shall ever
again become deprived of its lovely raiment.
This, indeed, is the characteristic of the works
of God as opposed to those of His creatures,—
that, while they must heap together a multitude

* Mr. R. Hunt has discovered that the rays of light which pro-
duce the effects known under the name of actinism are also necessary
to the first germination of the seed, in addition to the three requisites
mentioned in the text.

40 LIFE OF A TREE.

of means to accomplish a single end, He effects
a multitude of ends by a single means: and any
one who is familiar with the various kingdoms
of creation, will be able to call to mind a large
number of interesting examples, where this
beautiful truth is beautifully worked out.

iia or 7 a

‘ey

YOUNG TREE,

THE

THE YOUTH OF THE TREE. 43

CHAPTER II.

THE YOUTH OF THE TREE.

Tur morning of vegetable existence possesses
peculiar beauties, in common, indeed, with the
early dawn of life wherever it is found. Of
many created things, however, a young plant is
the most beautiful object we can select. The
tender stalk just rearing itself into the elastic
air, bending with every whisper of the wind, and
glittering with such a freshness of lustrous green,
that it almost looks as if the hand of Nature had
been varnishing it over anew with every morn-
ing’s light,—presents us with a work of Creation
so fresh and fair that it cannot be equalled all
through the world. The young leaves are tinted
with that peculiarly delicate green, which makes
Spring the sweetest season of the year. ‘They
possess, too, such a downy and delightful softness

44. LIFE OF A TREE.

of texture, as to make it a pleasure even to touch
these new-born organs. And the young branches
seem so full of sap, as if they would burst their
half-transparent coat. Then, too, every process
of life appears in such vigour! ‘The plant seems
to drink in with joy the fresh-fallen shower ;
and grows at such a rate as almost to become
visibly taller while we watch it. Strong in the
vigour of its youth, and beautiful as strong, it
has not yet felt the hardening influence of the
world into which it has entered. Hours of genial
sunshine gently pass over its head, morning and
evening showers drop softly on its tender struc-
tures, and the moist earth fills its hungry roots
with hourly food. It has never yet encountered
the fury of the tempest, nor felt the heavy sweep-
ings of the thunder-shower, nor the paralysing
influence of the clear, cold, frosty nights. Be-
fore it is called upon to undergo these trials of
vegetable life, it will have been hardened, and
strengthened, so that “as its day, so shall its
strength be.”

When we take up a young plant which has
just emerged from the bosom of the soil, and
place it in contrast with a full-crown tree of the

FRAGILITY OF THE YOUNG PLANT. ADS

same species, that which most strikes us in the
comparison is the tender and fragile tissue of
the one, and the firm, solid, and resisting struc-
ture of the other. The cause of this difference
will easily be guessed; it is the formation and
consolidation of wood in the latter; the young
plant, on its first emergence, consisting chiefly of
a delicate unresisting tissue, called by botanists
the cellular tissue. Were the plant to remain
in such a condition, that is, wholly made up
of cellular tissue, it could never become a tree.
The delicate cells are so feeble, and possess so
small an amount of the force of cohesion, or
sticking together, that even granting that the
plant grew up into a tree, and put out branches,
the first smart breeze would break off its head,
and lay the fragile trunk prostrate on the earth.
But God, who does “all things well,” could
never have permitted such a flaw in creation; and
He has therefore appointed means of the most
beautiful and faultless kind, by which it is so
contrived that in ordinary cases, so soon as ever
a plant comes into the broad daylight, imme-
diately woody tissue begins to be formed. Long,
though fine bands, of this firm tissue pass from

46 LIFE OF A TREE.

the leaves down to the roots, and brace up the
plant, so that, even when it is a few weeks old,
it is able to endure the angry buffetings of a
very tempestuous wind.

We must now proceed to take up again the
thread of our history. Having watched the plant
from the seed to the seedling, we have now the
pleasant task of tracing out the characteristics
of its growth. If we place the date of its birth
in the Spring, the advancing year brings fresh
strength and grace to the plant. During the
warm days of Spring and early Summer, the
number of its leaves, and its strength, stature,
and diameter, all increase. On cutting across its
stem at this early period, it would be found to
be divisible only into two parts: a central portion,
or pith, of cellular tissue; and an outer layer or
skin. But as the leaves multiply, and the whole
size of the plant becomes enlarged, the stem is
greatly altered too. The woody bands, descend-
ing from the leaves to the root, run between the
bark or skin, and the pith, and consequently
form a layer all around the pith, separating it
from the bark: this layer much resembles a ring,
and is called a concentric ring, or zone. Thus

AUTUMN.—WINTER. 47

three portions can be perceived in the stem,—the
bark, the ring of wood, and the pith.

As the year goes on, the whole plant still
increases in size, until Autumn, with its “sere
and yellow leaf,” comes apace. The leaves now
formed are converted into various coverings for
the little buds, which are to be found studding
over the branches in various places. The old
leaves fall from the plant, withered and dead,
having fulfilled their allotted part. The buds
become coated with a waterproof resin, which
defends them from rain, whilst they are guarded
from frost by several layers of leaves admirably
folded over these tender points. These prepara-
tions tell us that Winter is coming, and strikingly
illustrate the forethought characterizing all the
works of Creation. By-and-by, Winter, wrapped
in his white raiment, comes, and showers down
on the head of the young tree a load of snow,
while his cold breath covers the branches with a
varnish of ice. But the plant has nothing to fear
for itself, or for its tenderest organs,—all are
safe; and thus, in that very scene which we so
generally consider the most forcible representa-
tion of desolation, the snow-covered forest, a very

48 LIFE OF A TREE.

little knowledge of Botany enables us to see, in
these simple but effective protections, marks of
a Creator’s wisdom, traces of a Father’s love.
Are there no snow-storm epochs of the human
life, in which the instructed eye may not, if it
will look for them, see the same, causing the
heart to acknowledge that in the darkest hours
He is nigh, and that, be the trial never so sharp,
it is not without its alleviations !

The long days of Winter move gradually on;
now cold and sharp with frost, now dark and low-
ering with snow, and occasionally wet and chilling
with half-frozen rain. The plant is, as it were,
asleep. ‘To look at its stiff and naked branches,
one would say it was altogether dead; and if we
were to thrust a sharp weapon into its trunk, not
even a drop of fluid would escape from the
wound, It is waiting for the Spring, and while
it waits it sleeps; and so ends the first year of
the Life of a Tree.

But as the Earth rolls on her endless path,
gradually a warmer air wraps her round in this
our hemisphere. The ice-chain begins to be
loosed, though now and then a sharp frosty night
will close the cold links again. The great Sun

SPRING. 49

rises higher and higher in his daily circuit, and
his life-giving rays communicate warmth and
vigour to all creation. Animals shake off their
winter’s sleep, and come abroad out of their lairs.
Birds re-appear as if by magic,—for we scarcely
know where they all go to during the dark
Winter season,—and while they seek out their
mates, fill the fresh air with music. The surface
of the river moves again, and begins to be broken
into rings by the dancing flies and leaping fish.
Does the tree remain asleep while all creation is
awaking? Far from it.

The young buds cast off their thick Winter
coats, knowing that Summer is nigh at hand;
and as we watch the topmost of them, we may
see them turgid with juice, and ready to burst
into all the luxuriance of Spring. As they in-
crease in size they unfold themselves, and in a
little while we altogether lose the form of the
bud in the elegantly veined and now fully ex-
panded leaves. The same process takes place on
every branch; bud after bud disappears, to give
place to the beautiful young leaves ; and Spring, as
it advances, finds that the once barren and appa-
rently withered object, that looked as if insensible

E

50 LIFE OF A TREE.

to its encouraging voice when it was first heard,
has now become an elegant young tree, adorned
on every branch with the finest raiment, and of
the most pleasing colours.

It is easy to stand by, and watch these pro-
cesses as they gradually develope themselves ; and
a mere child can trace them from first to last,
as far as they are visible to the eye. But the
greatest philosopher cannot answer the inquiry,
—Why do they take place? or explain how
it is that the returning Spring re-awakens the
slumbering tree. This is because we are igno-
rant of what vegetable life really is. And though
chemistry can tell us much about its different
phenomena, and though the microscope may
actually shew us what takes place, we are still
as much in the dark as ever as to the power
which sets them all in motion. Let not the reader
suppose it is merely the returning warmth of air,
and the re-softening of the frozen soil, that are
alone necessary to recall the plant to life. There
is something more than this in the case; and
what this is, is yet hidden from our view. If a
plant were a mere machine, or if indeed it were
simply a beautiful form of chemical apparatus, it

PHENOMENA OF GROWTH. 51

would all be cleared up by reference to the well-
known laws of mechanics or chemistry. But
the plant is a living being; and that at once
explains our difficulty, while it leaves us in our
darkness.

It must not, however, be supposed that we
cannot give any account of what takes place: this
we shall endeavour to give as shortly as possible
in the clear and concise language of one of our
most eminent Botanists.* ‘The buds gradually
unfold, and pump up sap from the stock remain-
ing in store about them; the place of the sap
so removed is instantly supplied by that which is
next it; an impulse is thus given to the fluids
from the summit to the roots; fresh extension
and fresh fibrils are given to the roots; new sap
is absorbed from the earth, and sent upwards
through the wood of last year, and the phenome-
non called the flow of the sap is fully completed,
to continue with greater or less velocity till the
return of the Winter.

“The growing point lengthens upwards, form-
ing leaves and buds in the same way as the parent
shoot; as horizontal increase of the whole of the

* Dr. Lindley. Introduction to Botany,

52 LIFE OF A TREE,

cellular system (or pith) of the stem takes place,
and each bud sends down ligneous matter within
the bark and above the wood of the shoot from
which it sprang; thus forming on the one hand
a new layer of wood, and on the other a fresh
deposit of bark.”

We thus see, that the following distinct phe-
nomena may be recognised in this portion of the
history of a tree: the expansion and functions
of its leaves, the flow of its juices, and the for-
mation of cellular and woody tissue. It will be
convenient to speak of the flow of the vegetable
juices, previously to our mentioning some par-
ticulars respecting the other phenomena.

If in an early summer-day a notch is made
with a knife into the stem of a healthy succulent
plant, immediately it is seen to bleed, pouring
forth a clear, somewhat viscid fluid. If now the
notch is made deeper and wider, we can see from
which portion of the stem the fluid runs; anda
little examination will shew us that it is from the
stem below, and not from that above the cut that
it chiefly proceeds. We learn from this, that the
motion of the sap, for that is the proper name of the
fluid, is very strongly in the direction from below

SAP CIRCULATES. 53

upwards; for the cut surface next the ground
streams with the exuding drops: but if we look
at the upper surface of the cut, we shall find it
not to be quite dry, but that here and there
tiny drops of crystalline fluid are seen to flow
from countless minute tubes. This teaches us a
second fact about the circulation of the sap, in-
forming us that there is also a motion from above
down again toward the earth. If, again, we could
water the plant with some coloured liquid which
it would absorb, and were then to cut it quite
across, we should see that veins of colour ran to
and from the pith, indicating that the cellular
tissue (that is, the pith, and the horizontal rays
which we see radiating from it,) is also penetrated
by the sap. Thus, then, the sap moves from the
roots to the branches, from the branches to the
roots, and from the outside to the heart of the
stem.

Another little experiment will shew us through
what parts of the stem the two different currents
of sap move. If we only cut into the bark, a very
small portion of fluid exudes from the inner part
of the cut; and this comes from above. We have
already seen that the course of the sap in the wood

54: LIFE OF A TREE,

is from below; and we thus gather the important
fact, that sap vises through the wood, and descends
between the wood and the bark, and through the
inner portions of the bark also. Beginning from
the roots, we may trace its circulation through
the tree in the following manner. A_ heavy
shower of rain falls, and fills the soil with mois-
ture: as it filters downward it dissolves many
ingredients which it meets with in the earth, and
coming at length into contact with the delicate
roots, it is drunk in by them, and so enters the
system of the plant. Immediately it begins to
move upwards; passing along the roots it enters
the stem, ascends through the woody tissue, enters
the leaves, is there exposed to the light and air,
thence descends again through the bark, and
reaching the roots is discharged, having fulfilled
all the duties required of it, to give place to
the continually in-pouring stream which goes
through the same career.

The force with which this circulation takes
place is very surprising. By taking a young
growing branch of a tree, and fitting one end
of it into a glass tube, and by means of a little
cement making the joint perfectly tight, we shall

DR. HALES’ EXPERIMENTS. 55

be able to measure this force. A little water
must be poured into the tube; and taking care
that it does not run out, by placing the finger
on the open end, it must then be plunged into
a basin containing a little quicksilver. The ac-
companying cut will represent the method of
arranging this apparatus.. In a quarter of an
hour the heavy quicksilver will be seen to have
risen up into the tube, and
will rise until it actually
touches the end of the
branch. The great Dr. Hales
made some most beautiful ex-
periments on this subject, and
found a branch of a nonpareil
apple-tree, with twenty apples
on it, actually sucked up a
column of mercury a foot
high in seven minutes. ‘The
result of his experiments

shewed that, in some instances, #7 eee eck oF.
the power which moves the sap CIRCULATION.

in plants is five times stronger than that which
drives the blood through the artery in the horse’s
leg.

56 LIFE OF A TREE.

There appear to be two principal causes of this
singular phenomenon—the circulation of the sap.
One of them is, that the plant loses, by perspiring
through its leaves, an immense quantity of fluid,
which it can only obtain by sucking it up from
the cells next to it; and these becoming empty,
suck fluid from those below them; and so on, all
through the stem, down to the very roots. The
other is the singular phenomenon called Endos-
mose. Suppose on one side of the tube shewn
in the figure, we poured a measured quantity of
water, and on the other side an equal quantity of
milk, and separated the two fluids by stretching
a thin piece of bladder across the tube, just in
the bend at +. At first
thought we should say
that they would remain
without mixing toge-
ther... Butothe gone
trary is the case;
although there is an
imperforate piece of
animal membrane to separate them, yet, strangely
enough, the water goes through and mixes with
the milk, while little or no milk comes through

ENDOSMOSE-TUBES.

ENDOSMOSE., 57

to the water; so that, after a little time, the tube
containing the milk is fuller than that containing
the water, as is represented in the figure 2. This
in-rushing tendency of a thin fluid when only
separated from a thicker, such as milk, by a
delicate membrane, is called Endosmose. It is
supposed in the case of plants, that the greater
thickness or viscidity of the sap acts like the milk
in the tube, and attracts the thinner water from
the earth surrounding the roots, into the roots
themselves, and thus a sort of motion becomes
established. Undoubtedly the first is the most
powerful cause of the two.

The sap of plants is often highly valuable to
man. In North America an immense amount
of sugar is obtained almost exclusively from the
sap of the Maple: by boring a hole a proper
distance into the trunk, and fitting a wooden
tube to it, the free end of which dips into a
suitable vessel, a large daily supply of sweet
juice is obtained, which, on undergoing the boil-
ing and purifying processes of the manufacture,
yields a very pure and pleasant sugar. Several
members of the royal Palm tribe also furnish a

highly valuable sap. In the fair Island of Ceylon

58 LIFE OF A TREE.

palms are planted in regular order, for the express
purpose of tapping for their sap. These plan-
tations go by the name of toddy topes, the exuded
sap being called toddy. We are told that some
of these trees, in the hot season, will yield the
enormous quantity of one hundred pints of sap
in twenty-four hours. The sugar in this sap soon
causes it to ferment, and thus supplies the natives
with an excellent wine; and by distillation a very
burning sort of spirit called arrack is formed.
The strange Cactus tribe, with its leathery coat
of tissue so admirably adapted for the dry and
parched positions in which it is found, frequently
supplies the thirsty wanderer with a spring of
water in a dry and weary land, where no water
is for miles to be found. By stripping off the
outer coat of formidable prickles, an abundance |
of pleasantly-flavoured watery sap is found within ;
nor can it be doubted that by this peculiar pro-
vision, which has been called ‘‘ The Spring of the
Desert,” the life of the exhausted traveller has
frequently been preserved. Dr. Schleiden tells us
also that ‘‘ the wild ass of the Llanos knows well
how to avail himself of these plants. In the
dry season, when all animals flee from the glow-

THE MILK-SAP OF PLANTS. 59

ing Pampas, when Cayman and Boa sink into a
death-like sleep in the dried up mud, the wild ass
alone, traversing the steppe, knows how to guard
against thirst: cautiously stripping off the danger-
ous spines of the Melocactus with his hoof, and
then in safety sucking the cooling vegetable juice.”
Some races of plants, however, possess a large
amount of vegetable juice which widely differs
from sap, properly so called, in both its ‘appear-
ance and properties. In the common lettuce and
in the dandelion, we have good specimens of this
peculiar fluid or milk. Every one knows what hap-
pens when we break off the head of a dandelion-
flower,—how an abundance of milk-white juice
comes pouring up from the stalk, which possesses
a very peculiar smell, and leaves a sticky feeling
on the fingers. We shall call this the milk-sap of
plants. It is not, like ordinary sap, common to all
plants, but is peculiar to two or three families,
When we come to examine into the nature of
this fluid, we find in it a most startling resem-
blance to the blood of animals, or perhaps more
closely to their milk. It is well known that
either blood or milk, when drawn from the body
and allowed to stand, presently separates into two

60 LIFE OF A TREE.

parts,—a clot or cream, and a thin fluid or whey.
Singularly enough, this milk-sap has the same
property; when it is drawn from the plants in
which it flows, it separates, just as they do, into a
cream or clot, and a thin fluid or whey. Nor
can we mix them together again when they are
once separated in this manner. It is found that
the milk-sap when fresh drawn, before its sepa-
ration, consists of a vast number of small globules
floating in a clear fluid, and thus giving it a milky
appearance. On standing, the little globules col-
lect together, and float at the top like cream. It
is also very remarkable that this fluid is not, like
common sap, found in all the tissues of the plant,
but exclusively in a beautiful mesh-work of fine
tubes, which exist principally in the bark of the
milk-bearing plants. On this account the disco-
verer* of them was led to consider that the milk-
sap was really a sort of vegetable blood, and that
these tubes were the veins in which it flowed. But
it does not yet appear that this opinion is correct.

Although confined to a few vegetable tribes,
the milk-sap is almost of more value and im-
portance to mankind than the sap proper. When

* Prof. Schultz of Berlin.

CAOUTCHOUC.—WOORARI. 61

we enumerate caoutchouc, or India-rubber, opium,
and many terrible poisons such as the Woorari,
Upas, Strychnia, among its products,—that will be
sufficiently manifest. Caoutchouc is derived solely
from the milk-sap of plants: it is this singular
substance which forms the cream observed in the
separation of the milk into its two portions. The
supply is derived from several different trees
and regions of the world; and is obtained by
cutting deep incisions into the bark, and con-
ducting the thick and precious juice out, by
wooden troughs, into a proper receptacle.

The most fearful poisons known are found in
this juice. The savage Indian well knows this
fact, and dips his unerring arrows into the deadly
fluid of the Mandioc, or into the deadlier com-
pound familiar to us under the title of the Woo-
rari poison. In the thick ancient forests of
Java, where the step of man seldom enters, and
where the voice of the bird and the shriek of the
active monkey fill the air all day long with sounds
of life, grow some of the most swift-slaying plants
in the whole world. Even to touch the juice of
one of them will produce rapid and dangerous
blisters, The extracted juice of the other, when

62 LIFE OF A TREE.

applied to an arrow-tip, will instantly make the
stoutest brute inhabitant of the forest tremble
when pierced therewith ; and in a few seconds fall
to the earth in brief, rapidly fatal, death-spasms.

Yet, as if to counterbalance these poisonous
attributes, the milk-sap of some plants is perfectly
harmless. In the Canary Islands we are informed
that a milky juice is obtained from a tree, which
closely resembles sweet milk, and, thickened into
a jelly, is eaten as a luxury by the natives. But
the Baron Humboldt has related one of the most
interesting facts connected with this subject.
‘On the barren flanks of a rock grows a tree with
dry and leathery leaves; its large woody roots
can scarcely penetrate into the stony soil. For
several months in the year not a single shower
moistens its foliage. Its branches appear dead
and dried; yet, as soon as its trunk is pierced,
there flows from it a sweet and nourishing milk.
It is at sunrise that this vegetable fountain is
most abundant. The natives are then seen has-
tening from all quarters furnished with large
bowls to receive the milk, which grows yellow, and
thickens at the surface. Some drain their bowls
under the tree, while others carry home the juice

THE COW-TREE. 63

to their children ; and you might fancy you saw
the family of a cowherd gathering around him,
and receiving from him the produce of his kine.
We drank a considerable quantity of it in the
evening before going to bed, and very early in
the morning, without experiencing the slightest
injurious effect.” The name of this remarkable
tree is the Palo de Vaca, or Cow Tree, it is a
relative of the humble nettle which grows by our
way-sides. A similar tree, called Hya Hya,
flourishes in the dense forests of British Guiana,
and produces a milk of an agreeable flavour in
such abundance, that some travellers, having once
felled one of a large size that stood near a brook,
found that, in the course of an hour, it coloured
the water quite white and milky. It is time,
however, that we now retrace our steps, and
proceed to the leaves of the plant.

Taking the course of the ascending sap as our
guide, we are conducted into one of the most beau-
tiful and important studies of the whole vegetable
history. The clear stream of fluid penetrates
swiftly along the minute woody tubes, which
form the outer portions of the stem, carrying dis-
solved in it many soluble chemical salts, obtained

64: LIFE OF A TREE.

from the earth, and some soluble secretions which
it finds in the cells of the stem. Taking thus the
character of a liquid food, it rises higher and
higher, enters the leaf-stalk, and then sheds itself
into the thousand cells of the leaf. The structure
of the leaf is admirably adapted to effect the
alteration and conversion of sap into nutriment
for the plant. It consists of an upper and under
delicate layer of outer cells, which are very close
together, so that but little fluid can escape from
them,—this is called the epzdermis, or skin;
and between these two layers is a thicker one of
cells, through which bundles of woody tissue run,
forming the veins of the leaf. On the under
surface are a number of minute mouths, which
form the guardian-entrances to little air-cells
within the leaf, and are called stomates. ‘These
little mouths open and close, according to the
varying necessities of the leaf, sometimes being
open to allow moisture to escape, at others, open-
ing to admit the moisture of the dewy night, and
being closed afterwards.

Thus it is manifest, that there is the most
complete provision in this organ—the leaf—for
exposing to the influence of the air and light, the

THE LUNGS OF PLANTS. 65

juices poured from the stem into its countless
cells; and we shall find that both light and air
exercise a wonderful effect upon it, and upon the
whole system of the plant. If we were asked
What is the leaf to a plant? it would be per-
haps hard to give a better answer than—Both
its stomach and its lung,—that is, both the organ
for digesting food, and the organ for breathing
air. Dr. Lindley writes: ‘ It is not improbable
that the cells of a leaf which form the upper
stratum (or layer), perform a function analogous
to that of the stomach in animals, digesting the
crude matter they receive from the stem; and that
the lower stratum takes up the matter so altered,
and submits it to the action of the atmosphere,
which must enter the leaf purely by means
of the stomates.” Thus the upper layer is the
stomach, and the under layer the lung of the
plant. When we consider the usual position
of leaves, one surface always looking to the
sky, and the other toward the ground, we can
readily imagine that this is the case; and that
light acts principally upon the upper surface,
while air acts chiefly on the under. In the Aus-
tralian woods there is a singular exception to
F

66 LIFE OF A TREE.

this rule as to the position of the leaf-surfaces.
There trees are to be found which scarcely cast
a shadow, their leaves being twisted as it were
half round, and turning one edge to the sky, and
the other to the earth. Such trees form the
most singular features of the landscape.

Let us now ask the reader’s attention to an-
other interesting topic. Down in a deep cellar,
whither no ray of light has ever entered except
that of the dimly burning candle, lies a neglected
heap of onions. The moist earth on which they are
placed quickens several of them into life, and they
begin to put forth their sprouts. Doomed to an
unbroken darkness, and wrapped round by foster-
ing damps which rise from the floor, the shoots still
grow, and become lengthened considerably, strag-
gling about the place as if groping for the light.
The pleasant days of Spring pass quickly on, bring-
ing life and health to all the vegetable creation
above ground, while these poor prisoners stretch
out their pallid shoots hither and thither, and
weary themselves in their struggles for the broad
daylight—all in vain. At length they wither and
die, and soon become covered with mould, and
erumbled to dust. Why is this? Why were the

THE BLEACHED POTATO-STEM. 67

wandering shoots of a pale yellow? And why did
they wither away and die, leaving the empty
flaccid outer membrane of the onion, as the only
testimony to their ever having existed? It was
not because there was no soil into which the
fibrils of the roots might not have struck and
found food. Neither was it for want of air, or
warmth, or moisture. The following anecdote
will prove that something beside all these was
necessary. A potato lay in a dark place under-
ground, where a few rays of light would occasion-
ally steal in by a hole in the side. In due time it
began to shew signs of life, and in a short while a
tender sprout sprang from it. This sprout, like
that of the blinded onions, wandered about striv-
ing to escape from its dark den, until at length
it got within the influence of the pencil of light-
rays streaming in through the hole. Strange to
say, it groped about no longer, but made directly
for the hole, and before long actually pushed
itself through, and appeared in the glad light of
day above; here it grew, and became a healthy
plant. On carefully looking at its stem, it was
found, that all that portion of it which remained in
the underground cavity, was almost white; but all

68 LIFE OF A TREE.

the rest, which was sprouting out its leaves in the
free air, was of a dark, and refreshing green colour.

It was the absence of light, then, that proved
fatal to the unfortunate onions. Under the in-
fluence of light the green colour of plants is pro-
duced, and not without. The market-gardeners are
well aware of this fact; and, in order to prepare
for the table such vegetables as celery and aspara-
gus, they carefully exclude the light by means of
large earthen jars or pots, or by heaping up earth
upon the young growing plants. The stalks thus
become turgid with juice, but remain of a yellow
colour, veined, in the case of celery, with red lines.
Mr. Ellis states in the ‘‘ Gardener’s Magazine,”
that in North America the operation of light in
colouring the leaves of plants, is sometimes ex-
hibited on a grand scale, and in a striking man-
ner. Over the vast forests of that country clouds
sometimes spread and continue many days, so as
almost entirely to intercept the rays of the sun.
In one instance, just about the period of Spring,
the sun had not shone for twenty days, during
which time the leaves of the trees had reached
nearly their full size, but were of a pale whitish
colour. One forenoon the sun broke through in

THE INFLUENCE OF LIGHT. 69

full brightness, and the colour of the leaves
changed so fast, that by the middle of the same
afternoon the whole forest, for many miles in
extent, exhibited its usual Summer’s dress. Nor
is this the only result of exposure to the influ-
ence of light. As we shall presently have to see,
the formation of the wood of plants is proceeded
with under the influence of the light of day alone.
All the complicated phenomena of digestion, and
of the various chemical processes which take
place in plants, are equally the results of the won-
derful influence of the solar ray. Without light,
no odoriferous flowers could adorn our earth;
nor could any of the valuable and useful medi-
cinal resins which we find in plants, be produced.
Sometimes, indeed, human art avails itself of this
fact; and when we wish to procure a vegetable
full of sweet or limpid juice, and free from its
natural acrid, or even poisonous properties, we
cause it to grow in such a manner, as that light
can scarcely exert the least influence on the por-
tions weconsume. ‘Thus for instance—One among
other reasons for tying up the tops of lettuces, so
as to bleach all the heart-leaves, is to exclude the
light, and thus obtain a mass of leaves free from

70 LIFE OF A TREE.

.the narcotic properties which we find present in
the outer green leaves which are exposed to all
the glare of day. The bleaching of celery, above
noticed, has the same end in view ; for the celery
plant belongs to a highly poisonous family of
plants, and possesses many acrid qualities itself,
which would totally unfit it for the use of the
table if grown unbleached.

Such, then, being the effect of the absence of
light, we should naturally expect that in those
bright regions, where sunlight throws its golden
floods in greatest profusion, where the clear air
is seldom filled with murky clouds to dim their
rays, and where the rich Earth displays, as else-
where we find not, her primeval fertility,—here
plants must possess, beyond those of other re-
gions, the odoriferous and resinous products
which light contributes so largely to produce.
And this is so. Who has not heard of the spicy
breezes of the warm Ceylon? Where lie the lands
—the homes of the clove and cinnamon? Where
shoots the strong shaft of the Camphor-tree ?
Why is it that in Persia poets have sung sweetest,
of the sweet subduing odours of the rose—queen
of flowers? Why that in the glorious South Ame-

CHANGEABLE TASTE OF PLANTS. fa!

rican forests every air wafts its burden of the rich
and varied perfume of the orchid-flower? Because
here the light-gates of heaven are widest open ;
and here the genial, ever active and all-powerful
solar rays, quicken into existence products un-
known save by report to less favoured regions.

A very curious effect of light of a different kind
has been noticed in a plant which is a native of
India, named the Bryophyllum Calycinum. The
juice of this plant is said, on good authority, to be
quite acid in the morning, to be tasteless in the
middle of the day, and, more singular still, to
be bitter at night. This plant is not peculiar.
Liebig, the eminent German chemist, cites an-
other example in the Cacalia ficoides. The pro-
bable explanation of this strange alternation of
properties is, that during the night the plant
absorbs oxygen gas, during the lght of the
morning it loses it again, and at eventide, having
lost still more, it acquires a positively bitter taste.

Let us turn aside for a moment to speak of
a series of most singular experiments, which have
been instituted by several philosophers, and par-
ticularly by Mr. R. Hunt, on the influence of
different kinds of ight upon plants. Six boxes

ye LIFE OF A TREE.

were so prepared, that air was freely admitted
to the plants within them, without permitting
the passage of any light except that which passed
through the coloured glasses with which they
were covered. These glasses were of the following
colours: a ruby, a brown-red, an orange, a yellow,
a cobalt-blue, and a deep-green. ‘The young plant
first broke the soil in the box covered with
orange-glass, and last under those covered by
yellow, green and blue glasses. It was subse-
quently found that the effect of the yellow rays
was such as to prevent the germination of. the
seed, even although the rays only rested on the
surface of the soil, while the seed lay buried
beneath; and, again, that the blue light seemed
remarkably to favour this process. Under the
orange light the plants grew very tall, but had
white stalks, and refused to put forth any flowers.
Under the yellow light, it was remarkable that
a number of little fungi, or moulds sprang up
and flourished luxuriantly, while the plants them-
selves withered and died. Under the red light
the plants only grew an inch or two high, had
something of a reddish colour, and soon rotted

and perished, although supplied with abundance

COLOURED LIGHT. io

of food in the soil in which they were placed.
Under the green light the plants grew slowly,
but tolerably strong; yet none would flower,
notwithstanding the greatest care and attention
were bestowed upon them. The results under the
blue glass were very different. The roots germi-
nated a little less quickly than in the open air;
but the plants became compact and healthy in
their character, putting forth their flower-buds
strongly, and flowering in perfection. Under this
light alone did the various processes go on with
that vigour which is characteristic of vegetation
in the open air.

A very striking circumstance occurred in the
experiments with the red light. It has been
already seen that plants turn eagerly toward the
light; and this fact may often be witnessed in
our sitting-rooms where a plant is placed in a
window, for in a few weeks it is seen to have
bent itself, as if in grateful homage, to the light
of day pouring in at the window. Very opposite
to this was the behaviour of plants, upon whose
tender structures the fierce red rays were alone
allowed to fall. As if sensible of their dele-

terious influence, the plants actually turned away

74 LIFE OF A TREE.

from the over-powering glare; and this took place
in every experiment conducted on the subject,
—thus evidently shewing that the red light con-
tained some principle, to the presence of which
vegetation shews the greatest aversion.

These considerations lead us to another and
more remarkable feature of the vegetable life.
We have said above, that when a plant first
pierces the soil, and clambering through the yield-
ing particles. of brown earth lifts up its tender
stem to the gaze of day, it consists almost ex-
clusively of cellular tissue, and is therefore as
fragile as possible. To become useful in the world
of Nature, and for the purposes of man, it must
undergo an important change of nature ; in other
words, it must become wood.

Now it is a beautiful truth, that no sooner
does the plant see the light than this indurating
or hardening process actually commences; shew-
ing us that all things have been so harmoniously
ordered, that no sooner do circumstances call for
an alteration in the constitution of the plant,
than a fresh chain of events is set in motion to
effect this very end. Down below the earth the
firm woody tissue was unnecessary ; for there no

WOOD FORMED. 75

tempestuous winds can operate to threaten the up-
tearing of the tender thing. But when its young
leaves emerge, and bathe their fresh structures in
sunlight, dew, and air, then the period of danger
comes; for the clear sky may soon blacken with
clouds, and the still air be tossed into a hurricane—
and then, what of the probable fate of the fragile
plant, had not an All-wise forethought given it
inward strength before! And he that knows what
is the pressure of some storms of life, when
darkness and despair seem as if they would over-
whelm the man on whom their fury falls, may
often mark with wonder the firm endurance the
afflicted one displays, little considering that the
fair season before was the time when he was
strengthened to withstand the storm. Thus, to
the plant, the first gleam of daylight is a messen-
ger of health and strength, for with the falling of
the first ray of light upon its leaves commences
the formation of those down-penetrating woody
bands, which communicate resistance and endur-
ance to its youthful frame.

Where does the wood come from? If we were
to take up a handful of soil and examine it under
the microscope, we should probably find it to con-

16 LIFE OF A TREE,

tain a number of fragments of wood, small broken
pieces of the branches or leaves, or other parts
of the tree. If we could examine it chemically,
we should find yet more strikingly that it was
nearly the same as wood in its composition. Per-
haps then, it may be said, the young plant ob-
tains its wood from the earth in which it grows?
The following experiments will shew whether
this conjecture is likely to be correct or not.

Two hundred pounds of earth were dried in
an oven, and afterwards put into a large earthen
vessel: the earth was then moistened with rain-
water, and, a willow-tree weighing five pounds
was planted therein. During the space of five
years, the earth was carefully watered with rain-
water or pure water. ‘The willow grew and flou-
rished; and, to prevent the earth from being
mixed with fresh earth, or dirt being blown upon
it by the winds, it was covered with a metal
plate, full of very minute holes, which would ex-
clude everything but air from getting access to
the earth below it. After growing in the earth
for five years, the tree was removed, and on
being weighed was found to have gained one
hundred and sixty-four pounds, as it now weigh-

WOOD FROM AIR. ew |

ed one hundred and sixty-nine pounds. And
this estimate did not include the weight of the
leaves or dead branches which in five years fell
from the tree. Now came the application of the
test. Was all this obtained from the earth? It
had not sensibly diminished; but, in order to
make the experiment conclusive, it was again
dried in an oven and put in the balance. As-
tonishing was the result—the earth only weighed
two ounces less than it did when the willow was
first planted in it! Yet the tree which grew in
it had gained one hundred and sixty-four pounds.

Manifestly, then, the wood thus gained in this
space of time was not obtained from the earth.
We are, therefore, compelled to repeat our ques-
tion—Where does the wood come from? We
are left with only two alternatives,—the water
with which it was refreshed, or the air in which
it lived. It can be clearly shewn that it was
not due to the water: we are, consequently,
unable to resist the perplexing and wonderful
conclusion,—it is derived from the azr.

Can it be? Were those great ocean-spaces of
wood, which are as old as Man’s introduction
into Eden, and wave in their vast but solitary

78 LIFE OF A TREE.

luxuriance over the fertile hills and plains of
South America—-were these all obtained from the
thin air? Were the particles which unite to
form our battle-ships, Old England’s walls of
wood, ever borne the world about, not only on
wings of air, but actually as air themselves?
Was the firm table on which I write, the chair
on which I rest, the solid floor on which I tread,
and much of the house in which I dwell, once
in a form which I could not as much as lay
my finger in, or grasp in my hand? Wonderful
truth! All this was air.

In a note at the foot of a former page, we men-
tioned the composition of the air in general terms.
We may here re-state it a little more precisely
thus. After a careful analysis by some of the
most eminent chemists of the nineteenth century,
the true composition of the air we breathe is the
following, — supposing that one hundred cubic
feet were taken :—

Oxygen gas ° . ° . 203
Nitrogen gas : : - ° - 792
Carbonic Acid gas : : : Pe se
Carburetted Hydrogen gas i *

Watery Vapour—vuriable.
Vapour of Ammonia—traces.

CARBONIC ACID. 79

Carbonic-acid gas is the important ingredient
as far as our present subject is concerned. This
gas is contained in all effervescing liquids, is pro-
duced by burning wood or coal, or gas in the
air; and also by the breathing of man, animals, and
birds. It is a very heavy gas, much heavier than
air—so that, in fact, it can be poured from one
jar into another. It is moreover a highly poison-
ous, deadly gas, and if breathed for a little time
by any human being, it would rapidly destroy
his life. Yet, as we have said, every living be-
ing, at every moment of his existence, throws
from his lungs this same gas.

The composition of wood when analysed by the
chemists is very simple: it may be said, to speak
roughly, to be composed of one half of carbon and
one half of the constituents of water, or hydrogen
and oxygen gases. ‘The composition of carbonic-
acid gas is one part of carbon, and two of oxygen
gas; so that, to produce wood, we only require to
take away the two parts of oxygen gas, and to add
to it the constituents of water. But the highest
art of the chemist cannot effect this. He can
unmake wood, and accurately tell us what are its
components ; but to unite its dissevered parts so

80 LIFE OF A TREE.

as to produce a firm and solid substance like
wood again, he is altogether powerless. A blade
of grass, or the youngest and tenderest leaf of
the forest, is immeasurably his superior in this
as in all its other proper chemical processes.

Now we are prepared to approach this beau-
tiful page of vegetable history in the right man-
ner. We have been shewn that the source of
wood lies not in the soil, nor in the heaven-fall-
ing rain, but in the wide expanse of our envelop-
ing atmosphere. And that the minute portion
of carbonic-acid gas in the air is the ingredient
from which it is derived. The question now pre-
sents itself—How is this singular decomposition
effected? Knowing the
source of wood, shew
us the manner in which
it is obtained.—This we
shall proceed to do.

Suppose we pour a
little carbonic-acid gas
—7 into a glass jar, at the

EXPERIMENT oe A SPRIG bottom of which is o

OF MINT. little saucer full ‘of
water, and then drop a sprig of growing

THE SPRIG OF MINT. 81

mint into it, and stopping it up close expose
it to the sunshine for a certain time. May we
expect any change in the air contained in the
jar? Whether we expect it or not, a great
change will certainly take place. After the
lapse of a few days we shall find that, whereas
the air of the jar previously would have instantly
extinguished a burning taper, now the taper ac-
tually burns more brightly in the jar than in the
open air. And if we were sufficiently expert in
practical chemistry, we should detect the very
curious fact, that all the carbonic-acid gas had
disappeared, that in its place was an equal
amount of oxygen gas; and, in addition, that
the plant had increased in weight. We are
thus plainly taught that plants can decompose
the carbonic acid of air, and give back its two
parts of oxygen gas, keeping its carbon, which
they turn into solid wood, and thus increase
in weight.

This sprig of herb is a type of what takes
place on the large scale all through the vege-
table creation: the mightiest monarch of the
ancient woods can do no more, and owes all
its majesty of form and gigantic proportions

G

82 LIFE OF A TREE.

of structure to this simple fact. Thus then
the truth appears, that the vegetable world
obtain all their strength, solidity, and size,
from the decomposition of a gaseous ingredient
in the viewless air.

This function is principally confined to the
leaves. Owing to some mysterious and peculiar
power, the leaves are always drinking in carbonic-
acid gas from the air. After its inhalation they
have the power of condensing and decomposing
it; and the result is, that they pour back all its
oxygen gas, and retain all its carbon, out of
which they then proceed to elaborate woody
tissue. But this process of decomposition does
not go on but under certain restrictions. Tor
example, soon ‘‘as the evening shades prevail,”
from the grass blade to the rustling raiment of
the forest, all leave off work and cease to decom-
pose carbonic-acid gas for the night. The red
streak in the distant horizon, left by the down-
sinking sun, tells the busy vegetable crowd its
daily labour ’s done, and bids it fold its leaves to
rest for the night. Obedient to the signal, the
flowers fold up their painted petals, and droop
the neck in the full attitude of rest. The leaves

PLANTS REST AT NIGHT. 83

of many plants fall and le against the stem,
reposing from their labours. Night comes on,
The pale moon climbs the dark star-sprinkled
firmament, and sheds her soft radiance over a
slumbering world. ‘The hours steal by: man and
beast are still at rest, and vegetation shares the
general repose. But in the far East see the first
grey streak, the foretoken of the rosy-fingered
morning. ‘Then comes the cold and misty morn-
ing twilight; and in a little while the great Orb
of day himself rises in glorious golden majesty
above the horizon. All things awake now to
active duty; and the great world of plants is busy
again on its daily task of forming, out of gas,
the firm structures of branch and stem and
root.

Plants, however, do not wait for the full blaze
of morning sun to renew their toils. So soon
as ever a dim general light is thrown across
the earth—so soon do they begin their work;
although, of course, they perform it most actively
in full daylight.

This periodical resting of plants at night, is
a very interesting fact. It shews us that the
presence of the light of day is necessary to

$4: LIFE OF A TREE.

assist them in fulfilling their vastly important
office—the decomposition of carbonic-acid gas ;
and that when this is withdrawn, then this office
ceases until the return of morning. De Can-
dolle, the French botanist, tried to make plants
decompose this gas, by exposing them to the
rays of powerful lamps; but he could never
succeed in causing them to do so. Hence it
follows that sunlight is the agent which
quickens this process into existence, and which,
indeed, sustains it in activity when commenced.
And if we come to ask what principle it is
which exists in the light of the sun to cause it
to effect these changes, we can only answer,
that it appears to be the chemical or actinic
rays, which are chiefly concerned in effecting
it;

At night, when these chemical rays no longer
fall upon plants, as has been said before, the
process stops. For a long time some talented
philosophers actually thought that at night a
precisely opposite decomposition took place:
that is, that plants emitted carbonic-acid, and
absorbed or drank in oxygen gas, instead of
absorbing as they do in the day carbonic-acid,

PLANTS IN CITIES. 85

and pouring forth oxygen gas. And it is very
certain they do pour out a Jittle carbonic-acid
gas at night, but it is very small in quantity,
and seems to arise simply by evaporating from
the leaves, since the sap of plants always contains
a little of this gas dissolved in it.

Wherever plants are best exposed to sun-
light, as a general rule, there they are the
strongest and healthiest. Every one who lives
in a great smoky city, and takes pleasure in
trying to rear a few plants on his narrow window-
sill, must have wondered and at the same time
lamented over their pale and sickly look, as
compared with the deep green hues of the
country plants of the same species. The rea-
son is simply this, that the thick state of the
air, and the tall houses around, so diminish the
force of the light, that the poor plants only
receive a tithe of that received by those which
luxuriate on some sunny bank, looking to
the warm south, in the country. On this
account, trees which grow alone, and are there-
fore exposed on all sides to the light, are well
known to form more tough and durable tim-
ber, than such as grow in thick forests where

86 LIFE OF A TREE.

light reaches only their topmost boughs. The
brittle Wainscot Oak of the Black Forest is
produced by the same species as that which
produces the tough and solid naval timber of
Great Britain: but while the one is _ pro-
duced in half-obscurity, the other stands often
alone, enjoying the fresh light and air of our
broad fields.

If this is true, it may be said,—Then plants
would grow best of all if exposed to perpetual
sunlight. But this would not be the case.
It appears probable that no created being can
do without a certain amount of repose, and
plants among the rest. Their nightly cessation
from toil is as necessary to their health as
their daily amount of labour also is. Hence
where, as at the Poles, a continual shining of
the sun exists for a certain space of time in
the year, vegetation does not thrive under it
as it does in the regions where regular succes-
sions of day and night occur; and not a tree
is to be found in all those dreary kingdoms
of frost.

From the hundred thousand chimneys of the
great metropolis, every winter’s day, there proceed

CARBONIC ACID OF TOWNS. 57

some millions of cubic feet of the gas, whose
connexion with the world of plants has de-
tained us for the last few pages — carbonic-
acid. One healthy adult man, in the course
of a day of twenty-four hours, pours from his
lungs about fifteen thousand cubic inches of
the same gas, containing, upon calculation, about
six ounces of solid carbon. So that, if we
consider London to contain two millions of
inhabitants, this number of human beings every
twenty-four hours casts up, in the form of gas
from their lungs, the astonishing amount of
upwards of three hundred and thirty tons of
carbon. If we could reduce this to a solid
form, and suppose the products of London
respiration for one day stored up as charcoal,
or coke, and now grant that a family uses
twenty tons of fuel in a year, then the breathing
of the population of London for twenty-four
hours would furnish one such family with house-
hold fuel for sixteen years and a half, and would
demand a coal-cellar as great as two or three
houses put together.

These facts are mentioned, not to excite an
unreflective curiosity, but to impress upon the

88 LIFE OF A TREE.

mind the enormous mass of impurity daily thrown
into the atmosphere from one locality alone, and
to stimulate the reader to follow us with interest
as we proceed to inform him how, by a wise and
admirable regulation, it is all removed from the
air again; if indeed he has not already antici-
pated the solution to the difficulty. Let us
bear in mind then, that all men, all animals
and birds, and all combustion of fuel, are engaged
in filling the air with carbonic-acid gas, which
has been already said to be produced in breathing,
and from burning coal and other fuel. The ten-
dency of all this is to fill the air with poison,—
for carbonic acid is poisonous,—and consequently
to render it quite unfit for us to live in. And
there is not the least doubt that in time this
would actually take place, and the wide world
would not own either a man, beast, bird or
insect, all having perished by inhaling the deadly
atmosphere.

Now comes the beautiful discovery of the
office of the vegetable world to our relief; for
we find here a law at work which exactly
neutralizes all the poison, and restores its lost
purity to the atmosphere again. He who or-

CONNEXION OF PLANTS WITH ANIMALS. 89

dained the animal functions so as to throw out
this poison, also ordained the vegetable powers
to drink it in,—and more, even to live upon it.
Plants inhale the gas as fast as it is produced
from the opposite sources: out of it they form
their solid wood, turning the poison we might
almost say into gold, certainly into a material
of all others most necessary and valuable to
mankind.

Thus a beautiful connexion is established be-
tween plants, animals, and men. The vegetable
kingdom can no more dispense with this gas in
the air, than the animal with the oxygen gas,
which air also contains; nor can either say to
the other, “‘We have no need of you.” The
fact is, vegetables live upon what animals would
die from, and thus consuming the deleterious
ingredient, not only secure their own health,
but also that of the animate creation at the
same time. It seems that the great Creator of
all things never intended any part of His creation
to stand alone. Man himself is quite dependent
upon the beast of the field, and the tree of the
forest; and all through creation we may see the
same law prevail. Thus, little as the thought

90 LIFE OF A TREE.

may generally impress us, there is not a leaf
among the countless millions of the forest, nor
a blade among the green army of the meadow-
grass, which is not of importance to mankind
and to the brute creation.

Nothing grows in vain. The least flower has
a part of the great work of purification of the
air, that falls to it; for although it might not
be missed out of the innumerable ranks which
adorn the garden or the wayside, we must not
forget that the whole universe is made up of a
combination of little things, and though the im-
portance of a tiny plant may be little in itself,
it forms one of a number, which however vast
is, after all, only made up of individuals, each
having a share in the task to be done. We
might go even lower in the scale, and say, each
little cell of the green duckweed floating in our
quiet pools has its share of work; for it is an
interesting discovery, that even these little masses
of vegetation exercise a purifying influence upon
the boundless air.

Yet we must not forget to mention, that a
most remarkable class of exceptions to this rule
is known to Botanists. These are the curious

THE FUNGI. 9]

plants, of which we have before made casual men-
tion, the Fungi, or Mushroom tribe. Strange it
is, that these plants, instead of loving the pure day-
light, and eagerly pressing up into its presence,
both hate it and fly from it; and equally strange,
that instead of helping to purify the air, they
only help to pollute and poison it. Mr. Hunt,
in his researches on light, found out a very curi-
ous thing about these plants. It is well known
that the country people say the mushroom loves
to grow in the light of the moon; and Lord
Bacon tells us “‘that they come up hastily, as
in a night.” Now it is very probable this pro-
verb is founded in fact, and that the mushroom
tribe, if it loves any light at all, prefers that of
the pale, cold, silent moon “that walketh in
brightness.” Mr. Hunt found accordingly, that
mushrooms would grow luxuriantly under a yel-
low light, which approaches nearest to the colour
of the moonbeams. Perhaps some of our readers
may not know, that in the large underground
excavations, called catacombs, under the City of
Paris, there are regular nurseries for fungi, kept
by some of the poor inhabitants to supply the
tables of the rich with these delicacies. Here

92 LIFE OF A TREE.

they grow without one ray of light ever visiting
them, and thrive most luxuriantly. It is neces-
sary to take a candle to attend to these funny
plants; and a few months ago a poor mushroom-
grower nearly lost his life by his candle going
out, and leaving him in the dismal caves in
impenetrable darkness. Fortunately, after three
days his friends found him out, and rescued
him from his terrible tomb. Near Dresden there
are some extensive coal-mines which are cele-
brated for their fungi; for here they thrive
luxuriantly, and, what is more striking, they
possess luminous properties, so that they light
up the black galleries hewn in the coal, in some
places with such brilliance, and such a beauti-
fully soft irradiance, that the mine has all the
appearance of an enchanted palace.

These plants, as we have said, absorb oxygen
gas from the air, and exhale carbonic-acid,—-the
exact reversal of what takes place in the rest
of plants. Indeed, in this respect, they actually
resemble animals. This has been proved by some
interesting experiments performed on the sub-
ject by M. Marcet. We might therefore imagine
that fungous plants were actually prejudicial to

THE FALLING LEAF. 93

the welfare of the animal world; and, so far as
they exhale this gas, they are. But they have
been well called the ‘scavengers of nature ;”
for they live by consuming up what would
otherwise perhaps produce a poison. Hence we
find them upon decaying fruit, bread, &c.; and
they very soon remove all the offensive matter,
converting 1t into vegetable mould—after which
no further danger of its decay is to be appre-
hended.

But to return. The fair days of Summer have
gently glided over the head of the young plant.
The evenings draw in, the harvest is past, the
field again yields to the bright plough-share,
and puts on her brown dress once more, and
Autumn, heavy-laden with fruits, appears before
us in all her soberness and mellowness of aspect.
But what change is this which has come over
the plant’s leaves? Whose pencil has turned
their fresh hues of green into brown, yellow
and red? And see! the last brush of the wind
has scattered a heap of them at our feet. This
is the change and fall of the leaf!

It is a very difficult thing to understand the
precise nature of the changes which undoubtedly

94. THE LIFE OF A TREE.

accompany the mere change of colour in the
autumnal-tinted leaves. Mr. Hunt, whose name
we have before mentioned, is inclined to believe,
that the chemical influence of the sun’s rays
is modified or altered at this period of the year.
The change in colour of the leaves is, perhaps,
due to their absorbing oxygen gas, which they
will do in the dark and in other circumstances,
For example, if we expose dried green leaves to
the action of oxygen gas in a glass jar, and
moisten them with a little water, they rapidly
change colour and assume something of the
Autumn tint. Hence we may suppose, that the
exciting power of the chemical rays of the sun,
being less in Autumn than in Spring and Summer,
renders the leaves less able to resist the action
of this gas; and the consequence is, that even
while on the tree they feel its effects nearly as
much as if they were already dead and dried,—
and thus the change of colour is produced. This,
however, may perhaps be too abstruse a subject
for the general reader, and we must pass on to
ask :—

Why does the leaf fall? A great number of

talented men have endeavoured to give different

SUPPOSED CAUSES. 95

explanations of this subject also; but we must
confess it is anything but clear even now. One
eminent French Botanist tells us, it is because
certain delicate little tubes become suddenly
broken at the stalk of the leaf, so cutting
off the communication between the leaf and
the branch; and then, of course, it dies and
falls off. Another tells us, that the poor leaf
dies of overwork: it evaporates so much water,
that the solid impurities left behind fill and
choke up all its pores, so that by the Autumn
it can do no more work of this kind, and there-
fore dies and drops off. Dr. Lindley seems to
think, that it is due to both these causes com-
bined.

Though ignorant of the cause of these changes,
we may derive instruction from their solemn tones
of warning! ‘ We all do fade as doth a leaf!”
Just as after a few swift months of Summer, the
declining year tinges even the freshest forest leaf
with its under-tones of colour,— sure token of
advancing decay and death,—so the grave linea-
ments of age come upon the freshest and fairest
countenance, and carry the same lesson with
them: the day of life is nearly spent, the night is

96 THE LIFE OF A TREE.

at hand. Happy are they who, like the forest
leaves, well and faithfully fulfil the duties God
has appointed to them, and, like them, only “ rest
from their labours” when their allotted work is
done.

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THE ADULT TREE.

THE ADULT TREE. 99

CHAPTER III.
THE ADULT TREE.

WHEN a writer on fiction, taking up his tale,
as we have done, from the birth of the hero or
heroine, as the case may be, has exhausted all he
has to tell about the infancy and childhood of
these personages, he is very often obliged to have
recourse to a little artifice in order to get over
the years between youth and manhood; and he
generally tells us at the beginning of perhaps
his third chapter, that we must be so kind
as to suppose that a certain number of years
have slipped by between the close of the second
and commencement of the third chapters of
his book. We see no more convenient way
of getting out of the same difficulty; and we
must therefore beg the reader to be equally
indulgent to our history, which has the advan-

100 LIFE OF A TREE.

tage of being all true, and to imagine that ten
or twelve years have elapsed in the life of a
tree since we last took it up.

In the place then where, twelve years ago,
a pippin or an acorn fell, we now behold a
strong and vigorous tree. What a change is
this! The little seed, buried in insignificance
and weakness, has been raised in power: the
dangers which threatened its infant life,—the
sharp tooth of frost, and the rough wind of
heaven,—are now all at an end. No longer a
tender, fragile, delicate being, at the mercy of
the storm, or exposed to the peril of destruction
by the careless tread of the roaming beast, it
waves its comely branches on the summit of a
tall and stout, but pliant stem. Gliding time
has scarcely yet effaced the charm and grace
of youth from the tree. Its bark still retains
the smooth unwrinkled look of early years, and
rich in juices, bleeds forth a stream of green
sap if touched by the pruning knife. As years
roll on, all these, the distinctive features of the
tree just arrived at its perfect condition, will be
removed; and, wrinkled with many a deep furrow,
and made to look venerable with a coating of grey

SECTION OF THE TREE. 101

mosses or lichens, which give it the look of old
age, it will stand in the orchard or take its
place in the forest in much the same sort of
character as a gentleman of five-and-fifty stands
in human society.

If we were now to take a saw and cut across
the stem of the tree, we should find a very curi-
ous change to have
taken place in the
wood, A number of
distinct circles, like
those represented
in the cut, are seen
to surround the
pith which is in
the centre. And
also a number of
lines are observed
running from the
centre to the outermost ring. These circles
are the rings of wood mentioned at page 41, and
called concentric rings, or zones. The lines which
give the piece of wood a star-like look are called
medullary rays, and are supposed to be intended
to connect the pith with the circumference of the

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SECTION OF AN EXOGEN.

102 LIFE OF A TREE,

wood and intervening parts. The ring nearest
the pith was formed in the first year of the life
of the tree, and every succeeding year leaves its
mark in the addition of a ring for each, composed
of the wood formed during the year by means
of the leaves.

It is necessary however to say, that there is
a large division of
trees and plants in
which these rings
will not be found,—
such, for instance,

Pa: as

as the sugar-cane,
the palm-trees, and
many more. These
trees are also differ-
ent from such trees
as apple and oak-
trees, in that their
leaves are marked
with straight lines instead of like a net-work,
as will be noticed if we examine an oak-leaf.
These differences are also shewn in the cut.
The trees marked with the rings are called ex-
ogenous or dicotyledonous trees; those merely

SECTION OF AN ENDOGEN,

RING-MARKS OF THE STEM. 103

marked irregularly with holes, endogens or mo-
nocotyledons.

LEAF OF AN EXOGEN, LEAF OF AN ENDOGEN.

We have just said each of these rings stands
for a year. As will therefore be quickly ima-
gined, we have only to count up how many rings
there are from the centre to the circumference,
and we shall learn how many years have passed
over the head of the tree, or, in other words, how
old it is. And this is, in fact, a very sure guide ;
for the rings form a very correct register of the
age of the tree. A singular use has been made
of this fact, which deserves remembering. Many
of our readers are probably aware that the coal
which we burn for fuel was a very long time

104 LIFE OF A TREE.

since in the form of wood, and of living
plants. Now sometimes persons have found in
beds of coal pieces, which, though quite con-
verted into coal, still exhibit the marks of the
rings of which we have been speaking. These
persons, knowing that each ring was the sign of
a year in age, have counted them up, and have
thus been able to tell how many years old the
tree was before it was changed into coal. And
not only so, but as the rings are wider or nar-
rower apart, according as the seasons are fine and
favourable for the formation of wood, or as they
are cold and unfavourable to that process, they
have been able to learn also, almost, we might
say, What kind of weather it was at the particular
period when these very trees were alive, which
must have been at least many centuries ago!
This gives us a good illustration of the delight-
ful and interesting information, which even a
moderate knowledge of any science will enable
us to enjoy. Henceforward, when the reader
passes a tree felled by the woodman, and lying
by the wayside, let him spend a few minutes
over it in counting up the rings, which he will
readily detect at the cut end; and he may have

THE FOOD OF PLANTS. 105
the pleasure of knowing, without much chance
of being far wrong, the age of the fallen trunk.

So much for the changes that have taken place
in this interval. The Winter’s sleep is again
shaken off, and the tree begins to resume the
duties of life. In a little while, the forest, which
a short time since stood out all bare and rigid
against the clear, sharp winter sky, becomes gra-
dually clothed with leaves, and soon in such
abundance that the eye can no longer penetrate
as before into its inmost recesses. The voice of
Spring to creation—Awake, sleepers, and live!
has been heard over hill and dale, and all Nature
has responded to the call, adorning herself with
robes of living green,—coming forth as it were
to salute the beloved season.

Having in our last chapter glanced at the dif-
ferent duties of the leaves, let us now spend a
short time over those of the roots, and answer
a few questions upon the Food of Plants.

Some of our readers will perhaps say, Have
we not already seen that plants feed on air, and
obtain all their wood from the carbonic-acid gas
mixed in the air,—what more do we require?
True, but this is not all:—no! nor even, after

106 THE LIFE OF A TREE.

all, the most important food of plants. Some
pages back, in our home analysis of a seed, we
saw that it contained a sticky substance, which
we could wash out of a piece of dough by means
of water; this substance was termed gluten. It
contains a large quantity of the element which
chemists call nitrogen. Now where did this ni-
trogen come from ? and how did the plant obtain
it? The answer will come very quickly, perhaps,
into some minds. Why, the air is composed of
oxygen and nitrogen, therefore it was obtained
from the nitrogen of air. This ingenious reply,
however, will not avail us; for it has been posi-
tively ascertained that it does not come from the
nitrogen composing the air.

Perhaps there may be a little difficulty in
comprehending the exact nature of the correct
answer; but we shall endeavour to render it as
intelligible as possible. Beneath the spout in
yonder farm-yard is a wooden butt, into which
the rain, collected from the roof of the farm-
house, is conveyed, and is there kept for different
purposes. Let us remember, all the water this
butt contains comes from the clouds,—and as it
dropped through the air, naturally would dissolve

AMMONIA IN AIR. 107

anything of a soluble kind existing in the air
through which it fell. When this water has been
allowed to stand a day or two, we then find it
begins to smell rather disagreeably, and a good
nose might detect a faint odour, something like
that of smelling-salts, proceeding from it. This
smell is partly due to the presence of a small
quantity of a substance called ammonia, which is
composed, as the chemists tell us, of two gases,
—nitrogen and hydrogen. Now ammonia easily
dissolves in rain; and as it could not of course
have come from the roof of the farm-house, or
from the water-butt, it must have been obtained
from the air,—and the rain having fallen from
the clouds, must have dissolved it, and thus
brought it to the earth.

Now we are approaching the true answer.
Since we are quite sure that the element nitro-
gen in plants was not got from the gas nitrogen
composing the air, and since there is no other
substance in the air but ammonia which is com-
posed of nitrogen, it is only fair to conclude that
this part of the food of plants, for such it is,
was obtained from the ammonia floating in the
air. And this is the true reply.

108 THE LIFE OF A TREE,

This may not be thought to be very important
for us to consider; but what would the reader
say if we were to cut off all his supply of milk,
of cheese, and of fresh meat,—and how would he
thrive without them? Lach of these articles of
our food is produced actually from the ammonia
of the air in the following manner :—First, grass
and other plants receive ammonia by means of rain
as food for them, and make use of the nitrogen it
contains for their purposes. Second, the cow and
the sheep eat up the grass and other plants, and
they make use of the nitrogen they find in this
sort of food for their purposes; for example, to pro-
duce milk, and the ingredient which forms cheese
contained in milk, and, finally, to nourish their
flesh. Lastly, man consumes the milk, and the
cheese, and indeed the animals which form them
for iis food; and the nitrogen they contained
goes to strengthen and support his body. There-
fore we might actually say, that we ourselves
partly dive upon air; for one of its ingredients,
nitrogen, by means of these different channels,
comes to us as the most important element for
our nourishment. This is a beautiful link of
chemical processes, and well deserves the reader’s

EFFECTS OF RAIN. 109

thoughtful attention; nor is it, when thus pre-
sented to his mind, hard to understand, or to
remember.

Rain itself is also a most important part of the
food of the subject of our history—the Tree.
The great traveller Baron Humboldt certainly
tells us, that he has seen in some of the burning
countries he has visited, certain trees which really
seemed capable of living without rain; and for
months of bright and hot weather, during which
no rain fell, these singular trees preserved their
freshness of look as though they were watered
every evening. He could only account for it by
supposing, that at night the leaves possessed the
power of absorbing moisture from the air; and
thisis probably the real explanation of the pheno-
menon. Generally, however, rain or moisture from
the soil is indispensable to the health of plants
and trees. Mr. Darwin, in his interesting journal,
gives us a lively picture of the blessings of rain
in parts of Northern Chili. ‘ That the surround-
ing country was most barren will readily be be-
lieved, when it is known that a shower of rain
had not fallen for thirteen months. The inhabi-
tants heard with the greatest envy of rain at

110 THE LIFE OF A TREE.

Coquimbo. Iwas at Copiapo at the time, and
there the people, with equal envy, talked of the
abundant rain in another spot. In ten days a
single shower of rain covered a previous desert
place with pasture: and it was very curious to
notice that just so far as the shower extended
this green pasture existed; all beyond was as
barren as before.”’* Some calculations have been
made as to the quantity of water consumed by
plants, which are interesting. Thus a sunflower
has been found to consume daily twenty-two
ounces of water; and upon calculation, during
one summer, an acre of land planted with sun-
flowers, at a moderate distance apart, would con-
sume nearly two millions of pounds of water.
An acre of cabbages would consume more than
five millions of pounds in one summer, and an
acre of hop-plants as much as six or seven
millions of pounds.

The water is taken up chiefly by the roots
of the tree, is then converted into sap, and as it is

* In another place Mr. Darwin speaks of the effects of a great
drought. “During this time so little rain fell, that the vegetation
even to the thistles failed, the nooks were dried up, and the whole
country assumed the appearance of a dusty high road.”

THE BURNING LOG. 111

carried through the system of the tree it under-
goes various changes to fit it for the different
offices it has to fulfil. Wood, for instance, is not
purely carbon, but consists of carbon and the
elements of water, which were most probably
obtained by the tree from the decomposition of
the water taken up by the roots.

To pause for a moment here and to look back;
asking ourselves What have we seen as to the food
of plants? The answer is very simple: They live
upon carbonic acid, and ammonia, and rain,—all
derived from the air. Yet a little fireside experi-
ment will suffice to convince us, that this is not
the whole of the food of plants. <A_ brightly
burning log of wood lies blazing and crackling
on the top of the fire. Burning away in showers
of sparks, and casting up pale lambent flames, and
‘now and then informing us that its cells contain
water, which, being converted into steam and ex-
ploding, causes the cheerful crackling sounds we
hear—the fire gradually dies down, we retire to
rest, and repairing to the fire-place early in the
following morning, we discover nothing left of the
log but a heap of soft white ashes. Why has it
‘not burnt away altogether, as, if the wood had

112 THE LIFE OF A TREE.

been purely carbon, hydrogen, nitrogen, and oxy-
gen, it ought to have done, leaving nothing behind?
The same experiment, if we can call so trifling an
observation by so dignified a title, is made on the
large scale in many a clearing, or spot redeemed
from the forest in America. The settlers here
are overwhelmed with the ocean of wood, which
surrounds them, and effectually puts a stop to
the pursuits of agriculture; and they have no
resource but to cut down tree after tree and burn
them. What a grievous waste! will be exclaimed
by those who know the value of fire-wood, in our
less densely wooded country. But not entirely
so; the ashes are carefully collected, and are
melted down, and are then found to contain very
large quantities of the alkali called potash. This
is then sent to market, and fetches a very fair
price. We will mention another fact of a some-
what similar kind. In many parts of Wales a
species of fern grows wild in great numbers, and
beyond serving as litter for horses, or as thatching
for the cottager’s roof in the place of straw,
might be looked upon as a very useless plant.
The cottagers, however, estimate its value very
differently, and collecting it together in heaps,

ASH-BALLS., 113

set fire to it, gather up the ashes and form them
into balls, which they then send to the next
market-town, where they find ready customers in
the shopkeepers and laundresses of the place.
These balls are used as substitutes for soap in
washing; two or three being melted in water and
added to that in which the linen is washed. These
balls are, in fact, a collection of the alkaline and
other ingredients formerly existing in, and being
part of the food of the fern plants.

Thus, then, this interesting additional particu-
lar about the food of the tree comes out. It
requires certain chemical substances, besides those
which it derives from the thin and viewless air.
In the cases we have just mentioned, it is evident
that the alkali potash, which enters into the
formation of our common soaps, was a part of the
food of the trees and plants from which, when
they were consumed, it was obtained—from the
reason of its being itself incombustible. In ad-
dition to potash, the alkali soda and various other
substances are now found to be actually necessary
for the food ‘of plants.

Many persons must have noticed the advertise-

ments, in the different public papers, of different
I

114 THE LIFE OF A TREE.

kinds of manures to promote the growth of plants.
How do these act? It is possible that many who
employ, and some who even manufacture them, do
not clearly know. But it is hoped the reader of
this little book could, at this stage of our pro-
ceedings, give something like a correct answer.
They promote the growth of plants because they
supply to them these very substances about which
we have just been speaking—the alkaline and
other saline and mineral food of plants.* In or-
dinary circumstances, plants obtain this part of
their food from the earth; the rain, as it soaks
into the mould, dissolving out various salts,
which are then drunk in by the tender rootlets
of the tree—and so form part of its food.

The great chemist Baron Liebig, who first
explained this very remarkable fact about plants,
proposes a very ingenious and useful application
of it. He says we have only got to burn a plant,
and then get a chemist to analyse or find out the
different substances contained in its ashes; and
we thus have a sure guide as to what sort of
manure we ought to give it, supposing we wish
it to become very fruitful and supply us with a

* Some manures, such as Guano, supply plants with ammonia also.

MANURES. 115

large quantity of food. And he has even taken
out a patent, which he has sold to Messrs. Mus-
pratt of Liverpool, for the manufacture of an
artificial manure adapted to supply every kind of
plant with the saline and mineral food it requires.
Thus it is probable that the science of chemistry
will, in course of time, most materially increase
the fertility of our fields and meadows, and help
to supply the poorest of the land with cheap and
sufficient food. Soon may this time arrive!

It will be easily understood that in nature,—
say in the wild wood,—or on the open moor,
plants will grow best where they can find most
abundantly this food which they require; and
as the nature of the food required for different
plants varies, it is also plain, that whenever plants
find just that peculiar sort of food in the soil
which they require, there they will grow most
abundantly. ‘This, in part explains to us what
otherwise seems a great mystery, as will be evi-
dent from the following particulars, in which it
will be noticed that each plant has, as it were,
its own district or home.

There is a pretty and peculiar little plant called,
from the singularity of its flowers, the man-orchis,

116 THE LIFE OF A TREE.

growing in some southern districts of England,
which is invariably found upon a soil containing
lime or chalk. Another of them, the bee-orchis,
is often found in chalk-pits. In Switzerland a
very beautiful plant of this species is found grow-
ing upon the Alps. Whenever the soil contains
limestone in this country, there the plant may be
generally found. But as we travel on and enter in
a region, which, though outwardly similar to the
last, is found to contain a soil in which no lime-
stone exists, there we cease to see the beautiful
‘ Jady’s-slipper’”—the name of the plant,—until,
continuing our travels, we come again to a lime-
stone district, where we behold its striking
flowers once more adorning the way-side. Again,
Have none of our readers in their sea-shore wan-
derings, fallen in with a peculiar class of plants
which they will look for in vain in any other po-
sition? Why is this? Undoubtedly, answers the
chemistry of vegetation, because the salt matters
contained in the sea-shore sand are necessary as
a part of the food of these plants :—that this is
really so we are able to illustrate by a little cir-
cumstance, which came under our own notice.
Having occasion to make some researches in

VISIT TO A SALT-DISTRICT. 117

the salt districts of Cheshire, the most appro-
priate spot for so doing was considered to be the
neighbourhood of Northwich. We descended
into one of the mines, and explored the vast
beds of rock-salt, which are here hollowed out
into glittering caverns, resembling enchanted
palaces. Afterwards we repaired to some immense
salt-works where the brine is pumped up from the
earth and then boiled down; and here large
reservoirs are placed for containing the brine.
Conduits, or wooden pipes, run from one to
another of these reservoirs; and as they are not
made very water-tight, a number of little streams
of the salt-water run out and fill the surrounding
soil with salt. The bad and refuse salt is also
thrown upon the surface; and, in fact, the whole
district around abounds with saline matters, per-
haps even in greater abundance than on the sea-
shore. Now, to shew that it is not a mere acci-
dent which confines particular plants to the sea-
shore, but that they really live there because they
find there the salt food they like best: all along
the way-side in this district these very plants
were found, which are generally the dwellers
near the sea. It is easy to guess the reason.

118 THE LIFE OF A TREE.

The soil contained a quantity of salt; and as
these plants require a quantity of salt as part
of their food, here they are to be found growing
just as plentifully as if in their general position
by the side of the restless sea-waves. It is
worthy of particular notice that at this position—
namely at Northwich—the plants are at least
thirty or forty miles from the sea; and conse-
quently their being found in this spot was en-
tirely due to its containing that which forms part
of their particular food. All around the district,
the trees, shrubs, and plants were of the usual
inland character ; but here, where a sea-side salt-
ness existed, there was also a sea-side vegetation.
We hope this little anecdote will both strongly
impress the fact we are seeking to establish upon
the reader’s mind, and that its import will be
fully comprehended. A number of other in-
stances of the attachment of plants and trees
to particular sorts of soil could be mentioned ;
but these are sufficient to illustrate the point in
question,—which, we may be allowed to repeat,
is, that besides carbonic acid, ammonia, and water
from the air, plants both require and obtain
various salt matters, and even earthy matters, in

MINERAL FOOD OF PLANTS. 119

small quantities from the soil, which form a part
of the necessary food of the tree.

It will perhaps be interesting to give one more
illustration of the proofs of the truth before we
part with it; which we shall do in the following
manner. A few years ago, after a terrible thun-
der storm, in Germany, some persons in passing
through a meadow came to a heap of black
shining glassy substance, which they were much
perplexed about. This mass was taken to the
learned men of the town, and caused to them
as much perplexity as it had done to the rusties
who brought it to them. Some said it was this
thing; others said it was that; and the great
number of them believed it to be a stone fallen
from the sky, of the same nature as those called
meteoric stones, which we well know to have
done so. After some time it was determined to
get a chemist to unravel the difficulty; and a
piece of the substance was given to him to try
his experiments on, in the hope that he might be
able to tell what it was. In the meanwhile the
owner of the meadow was astonished to find that
a good-sized stack of hay, which he had carefully
placed in this very meadow, was gone, nowhere

120 THE LIFE OF A TREE.

to be found! Not so much as a single stalk of
hay was left, and he had to mourn over his loss
without being able to get the least clue to the
perpetrators of the damage. Thus matters re-
mained for a time.

At length, greatly to the relief of the per-
plexed philosophers, and infinitely to the asto-
nishment of the bereaved farmer, the nature of
the shining molten mass was found out. M.
Gmelin, the chemist, after several experiments,
found it to consist not of iron or such matters,
like “‘ meteoric stones,” but of a substance which
forms the outer coat of grass and hay, and may be
called a sort of compound of sand and potash.
Now all was cleared up in an instant :—a flash of
lightning had struck the farmer’s stack of hay,
consuming it in a moment, and leaving only the
black melted mass, consisting of the salts and the
earths in the hay, which had formed a part of
the food of the grass, behind it. ‘Thus was this
curious problem resolved.

Now all the glassy coating of a straw, which
gives to the bonnets of fair ladies that shining
look, is composed of earthy matter forming a
part of the food of the wheat plant. Sometimes

BAMBOO-MANNA. 121

we may actually find this earthy matter in the
stems of trees, which, like straw, have a polished
glassy outer surface—as the bamboo. Frequently
indeed in the hollow trunks of this tree, the
bamboo, large pieces of it are found, which are
like the more friable sorts of stones in hardness,
and are called by the name tabasheer. It is some-
times called “* Bamboo manna,” and is still sold
in Syria, Turkey, and parts of India as a medi-
cine.

Thus, to sum up what we have said about the
proper food of the vegetable subject of our history,
—the Tree—we find that it is obtained in several
ways. The firm wood was got from the carbonic
acid of the invisible air; the valuable nitrogen,
which forms the parts of the seeds or fruit most
nourishing to man, was derived from the am-
monia floating in the air in small quantities; and
its juices from the rain descending from the
clouds. Besides these, the different saline and
earthy matters, which we also find to form a part
of the vegetable diet, were obtained from the
soil, being received by the plant or tree by means
of its roots. So that, wonderful to say, the plant
receives by far the greatest part of the material

122 LIFE OF A TREE.

out of which it is formed, from the air,—and not,
as we are naturally inclined to believe, from the
earth! We have, however, lingered long enough
over the food of plants.

While we have been loitering to explain this
part of the life of a Tree, a month has made a
vast change in the look of our friend. See now
the tree is in full dress, and on every branch
behold a cluster of sweet smelling flowers! The
air around teems with fragrance; and the tribes
of insects come in crowds to pay court to the
vegetable beauty, and to taste the sweet juices
locked up in every flower. Our tree may be
thought to be rather late in flower, for the tide
of summer has reached its height, and many a
Spring-flowering shrub has long since strewn its
blossoms on the earth. But we gain this advan-
tage, that the Spring-flowers are mostly pale, and
often but feebly scented, while those of these
warm and genial days are of a full rich colour,
and emit a powerful fragrance, except at night,
when they seem to lock up their caskets of scent,
only to reopen them with the returning smile of
the sun.

This is rather a singular fact,—the difference of

VARYING COLOURS OF PLANTS. 123

colour in the flowers of various seasons. Spring
is characterized by its peculiarly light and fresh
tints of colour; Summer, by its brillianey and
variety of contrast; and Autumn, by the subdued
and mellow tones in which all vegetable nature
seems steeped. These beautiful changes of aspect
are, doubtless, connected with some physical cause,
and must not be looked at simply as matters of
interest only to the eye, or to the artist. As
faithful historians of plant history, it becomes us
to ask what is the cause of them.

There can, we believe, be but little doubt they
are connected with some peculiar difference in
the nature and quality of sunlight at these dif-
ferent seasons. Merely to recal to mind the pe-
culiar tones of the sky at these different seasons,
would suffice to supply us, after a rude manner,
with this conjecture. What early riser but
knows the cold, pale, and almost ghastly look of a
March morning? and during the day the pecu-
liar whiteness of the sky must be familiar to
every observer. In summer, deeper tints accom-
pany the rising and the setting of the sun, anda
bright glow seems during the day to rest on every
living and inanimate object. Autumn takes on a

124 LIFE OF A TREE.

tone more deep and full than all; and her skies,
like those of the old masters’, abound in a pecu-
liar richness of colour, the mere contemplation of
which sheds a soft and almost hallowed influence
on the mind.

It is not, however, yet positively known what
the difference in light here spoken of is really; nor
does it appear very probable it will be discovered,
at least for some years to come.

Taking one of these most beautiful appendages
of the tree in our hands, we may ask, What is
the exact cause of the colour so exquisitely in-
laid in the striped petals of this flower? Some
thoughts, which occupied us on a previous page,
will perhaps help us to answer the inquiry. We
there found a poor imprisoned potato putting out
a shoot in the dark, which was as white as the
most delicate flower, but as soon as it crept into
the light becoming all of a sudden of a deep
green. Why then do not white flowers turn to
green when exposed to light? Let the reader call
to mind what was said about the little cells which
make up the whole structure of the plant. Some
of these little cells contain a substance which,
when exposed to light, undergoes various changes,

BLESSINGS OF SUN-LIGHT. 125

and accordingly reflects either a green, or some
more brilliant colour; those parts which are
white do not perhaps contain this substance at
all, and therefore the white appearance is simply
the pure lustre of the tissue filled with limpid
juices. It is quite certain the sunlight is the
great cause which, as we might say, paints the
flowers in all their splendid colours: remembering
always the words of our Saviour Jesus Christ,
who in telling us to consider the lilies of the
field, and that Solomon in all his glory was not
arrayed like one of these, reminds us that it is
God who has so clothed the grass of the field; and
though we may, therefore, certainly say that it is
the light which brings all the glories forth, we
must also remember it is God who not only said,
“Let there be light,” but also so created the
beautiful tissues of the plant, that when the solar
rays fall upon them, they produce all those
lovely tinges which so much delight our eyes.
Truly, when we consider how much every plant,
from the lowest and least of the field to the
tallest and strongest of the forest, is indebted
to the genial influences of the sun’s rays,—had
they a voice to speak, they might exclaim with

126 LIFE OF A TREE.

the sacred writer, “A pleasant thing it is to be-
hold the sun !”

It is very singular that some flowers do not
retain the colours they at first appeared in. The
most striking instance is a flower called the
Chameleon cheiranthus. 'This is at first of a
whitish colour, then it becomes of a beautiful
lemon-yellow, then red, and last of all, it changes
to violet. The tamarind-flower is white the first
day it opens, and yellow the second! and the
flowers of a creeper, which, from its rapid
growth, is a great favourite among the artificial-
bower florists around London, the Cobaa scan-
dens, are of a greenish white on first opening,
and by the middle of the next day have altered to
a deep, beautiful violet. An instance stranger
even than these, exists in the flowers of another
plant; these are white in the morning, pink in
the middle of the day, and brilliant red at night.
These changes are probably due to a combined
chemical action of the air and the light of the
sun.

Whence comes this balmy odour which, rising
from the flower-crowned tree, fills all the air
around with ‘‘a pleasant smell?” This is one of

PERFUME OF PLANTS. 127

the “hard questions” of botanical science; and
we fear we can only say—We cannot tell. There
is no doubt it is a chemical process of some kind
or other, taking place in the thousand cells which,
united, form the flower. The fragrance is most
exquisite of its kind, and in its soft and delicate
nature is immeasurably superior to those burning,
pungent, scented spirits which are called artificial
perfume. The morning glittering with the drops
of a new-fallen shower, or the dewy close of day
are the best times for enjoying the pleasures of
the garden; for then, borne on the moist wings
of rising vapours, the fragrance of the flowers
streams out in richest abundance. Then indeed
“all nature seems as if offering up incense in
gratitude for the refreshing powers of dew.” In
the dry and sultry period, called in Scripture lan-
guage by the expressive term the “heat of the
day,” the perfume of plants is not to be per-
ceived, or at least with but a very small propor-
tion of the power in which it is poured out when
the twilight shades come on. It seems probable
that this is entirely due to the comparative absence
of moisture in the air at the one period, and to
its presence in the air of morning, or of eventide.

128 LIFE OF A TREE.

Some flowers are quite exceptions to this rule.
Thus there is a splendid flower called the
night-blowing cereus, which is scentless all day,
but at night bursts into fragrance, and fills the
conservatory with odour. This remarkable
flower begins to put forth its delicate scents
about six or seven in the evening, and continues
almost literally breathing forth perfume until
about midnight, when the process ceases, and the
flower becomes scentless as in the day. Some
of the Pelargoniums and Orchids have the same
curious property. ‘These facts only serve to make
us more puzzled than ever about the source and
cause of odour in flowers. They shew us, after
all, how little science knows of the more deli-
cate and minute points in Natural History ; and
while they may make us more diligent in pur-
suing our researches, they should also make us
more desirous for the arrival of that period when
“though now we know only in part, we shall
know even as we are known.”

The sun is sinking toward the horizon, the
evening breeze springs up, and whispers the
leaves of the wood to sleep; high in the clear air
an army of rooks speeds its straight, undevious

PLANTS SLEEP. 129

way to the far-distant forest home ; the lowing of
home-wending kine, with the clear whistle of the
ruddy cowherd, comes in wave-like flows through
the air; and the watch-dog, shaking himself after
his afternoon’s half-slumber, announces that he
has commenced his sentinel duties by a periodical
yelp. It is the approach-time of rest. But what
of the Tree ?

We have already said, that at this time the
leaves rest for the night from their duties of
decomposing carbonic acid. But a more singular,
because more apparent phenomenon, will be found
in taking notice of the general aspect of the tree,
and of vegetation in general at this time: they
have the very aspect of repose. The field of
corn, with its legions of waving stalks, carries all
the appearance of its countless blades being
asleep. The leaves hang flaccid and drooping,
and every ear bends its head as if in gentle slum-
ber. Looking at the tree, a less sensible evi-
dence may perhaps be found in this case; but
even here the leaves are less erect and stiff, and
the flowers, more sensitive than they, are all
shut up, the petals folding over one another,
and the tender flower-stalk gently drooping to-

K

130 LIFE OF A TREE.

ward the stem, as if to take shelter under the
wing of the adjoining leaves.

The great botanist Linnzeus first paid scientific
attention to this phenomenon, which he called
the “Sleep of Plants ;” and his attention was
first directed to it in avery singular manner. He
had received from a scientific friend, the seeds of
a beautiful lotus flower, which in due time grew
into elegant plants, adorned with some splendid
flowers. His gardener, having been absent when
they came into bloom, immediately on his return
in the evening was taken by his master to the
greenhouse, to admire the new and _ splendid
flower. Great was the astonishment and disap-
pointment of both, to find on reaching the spot,
that all the blossoms had disappeared! The
following morning, on his next visit, all the
blossoms were again put forth, and the same
evening had again disappeared. On carefully ex-
amining the plant, the mystery was all dispelled;
for it was found that the blossoms, as evening
came on, withdrew from the dim twilight, and
folding themselves up, disappeared under the
drooping foliage of the plant.

Pursuing the subject further, he was able to

A FLOWER TIME-PIECE. 131

arrange a number of flowers in the order in
which they open and shut; and found that many
flowers close even in the full blaze of day, while
others close at various times from mid-day to
sunset. Singularly enough, the flowers are very
regular in what we may term their time of going
to bed; so much so, that Linnzeus contrived a
flower-dial, by means of which the time of day
might be known, according as the flowers con-
tained in the list were open or shut. It must
be mentioned, however, that the flowers depend
a good deal on the sun; and if heavy clouds cover
over his glorious rays, the time when they open
or shut will be deranged. This has been parti-
cularly noticed in the time of an eclipse; when
it has been found that, misled by the darkness
spread over the earth by the obscuration of our
luminary, not only have flowers folded themselves
up to sleep, but even birds and beasts have
betaken themselves to their rest.

There are some exceptions to this general rule.
Just as in the ranks of human society, there are
fine ladies and belles who blossom, so to speak,
only at very late hours in the evening, when the
commoner folk are all in bed; so among the

132 LIFE OF A TREE.

flowers, some of which lie asleep when all the
rest of the sun-lit world 1s awake and astir, and
only put forth their beauties to the air of night.
Dr. Lindley tells us that the wnotheras unfold
their blossoms to the dews of evening, but
wither away at the approach of day. And the
splendid cereus, from which we lately parted,
also only displays its glowing colours and exqui-
site form in the darkness of the conservatory.
That however, in the generality, the sleep of
plants is due to the withdrawal of the sun’s rays,
is sufficiently evident from some curious ex-
periments performed by the French botanist De
Candolle. He found that he could reverse the
order of opening in flowers, by means of artificial
light, and caused those which he experimented on
to close during the day by keeping them in the
dark, and to open at night by exposing them
to the blaze of lamps and candles. We are
unable to explain how light acts in this remark-
able way; and from the exceptions just mentioned
to the general rule, we can only conjecture that
it cannot be altogether due to the influence of
light, but that some other cause must exist, which
has something to do in the production of the

IRRITABILITY OF PLANTS. toa

phenomenon. Perhaps it is in some manner
connected with the very peculiar vegetable
function of which we are now about to speak.
This is called irritability. There are many
points in which a sort of similarity between
plants and animals may be traced, such as the
motion of their juices, their functions of respira-
tion and digestion, and in the formation of their
different tissues; but one point is denied to the
vegetable world by almost universal consent—the
power of motion. Perhaps we shall succeed in
shewing that even this must now be given up,
and that plants, in some instances at least, are
really possessed with a notable, although limited
power of moving their various organs. Indeed
if we were to look at the very meanest plants,
which are of a size only to become visible to the
eye with the aid of the microscope, we might lay
our finger on some which cannot be distinguished
in many respects from minute animalcules, but are
able to move about from place to place, yet in
every other particular resemble plants. In the
higher plants, such as trees, &c. we have nothing
of this sort to tell of, from the reason that they
are necessarily tied to a certain place by their

134: LIFE OF A TREE.

earth-embracing roots, and hence they have
neither the power, nor probably the instinct, if
we can say so much about a tree, to remove. But
we have no doubt the singular movements of
which we are about to speak, will equally interest
the reader.

The sensitive plant, Mimosa pudica, is a well-
known instance of these singular movements.
If one of its tender leaflets is gently pinched, the
whole plant seems to resent the injury, and all
the leaves of that branch first fall low and droop,
and this extends itself, if the touch is pretty sharp,
through every branch and leaf, until the plant
droops from head to foot. It does not recover
itself for some time afterwards. De Candolle
informs us of another plant, somewhat resembling
the sensitive plant in this respect. It is a native
of Senegal, and is called by the inhabitants, the
“How d’ye do?” plant, because, when touched,
its leaves bow down as if about to salute those
who touch them. He also relates another equally
singular instance in a plant, a native of Dominica,
and called, from its peculiar movements, the
Sentinel plant. While all the other leaves are
bent down, one is sure to be found erect, and as

~

VENUS’S FLY-TRAP. 135

if on the look out for an enemy. After a certain
time this leaf comes off guard, and then another
slowly rises up and becomes sentinel, and so on
through the entire plant! Some of the wondrous
flowers of the orchid tribe display a class of
movement equally interesting. Thus we read of
one, discovered by Mr. Drummond, growing in
the Swan River Colony, the flowers of which
form a perfect insect-trap in the form of a box
with a moveable lid. The poor flutterer, enticed
by the odour and lustre of the flower, greedily
plunges into its painted dungeon, and that instant
is locked up safely by the lid dropping upon it.
By-and-by, however, the flower seems to relent,
and gradually opening, allows the insect to escape,
with no other harm than a good frightening.

We cannot say that the remarkable plant called
Venus’s Fly-trap is equally merciful. This plant
is a native of Canada, but is to be found as a
curiosity in some of our large conservatories.
Its leaves are formed in a very remarkable man-
ner. They are armed with sharp teeth on the
edges, and are able to close together, exactly like
the two springing pieces of a rat-trap. The
thoughtless insect, tempted to rest on the green

136 LIFE OF A TREE.

surface of this leaf, is instantly not only captured
but often squeezed or pierced to death by the
two sides of the leaf springing up and clasping
it between their cruel embrace. The English
Fly-trap, the Sun-dew, a tenant of the bog and
marsh, has the same class of movements, catching
its prey by the viscid, birdlime-like juice which
exudes from the hairs on the surface of its bril-
liant red leaves,—and subsequently the leaves fold
over the prisoner, Some curious experiments
have been made with a view to ascertain whether
this peculiar property of seizing upon insects was
connected with a taste in the plant for such a
sort of food, and a Venus’s Fly-trap was fed with
pieces of raw meat, and it was actually found
that it thrived better than one which had no
such supply of animal food !

The flowers of the common berberry-plant,
and of the geranium, when carefully examined,
have been frequently found to possess very cu-
rious movements in some of their parts. And
those of another genus will, when provoked
by a fine-pointed instrument, cause their central
organ or column to fling itself violently from one
side of the flower to the other.

A DANCING PLANT. 132

For our last and most surprising instance, we
must transport ourselves in imagination to the
fertile banks of the mighty Ganges. Little
wonder indeed if here we find things marvellous
and strange, when we consider the exuberant
fertility of the rich soil, ever moistened by the
sacred waters, and its vegetable offspring nur-
tured under the animated influences of a tropical
sun. As the overpowering floods of light and
heat, pouring down upon us from on high, are
too much for us safely to endure, let us seek rest
and shelter under this broad-leaved tree, whose
meandering roots bury themselves deep in the
soft mud forming the river’s edge. The great
stream rolls smoothly down, and seems the em-
blem of the course of the river Time, quietly
rolling itself into the eternal ocean; and lke it,
alas! carrying down, even before our eyes every
now and then, the floating body of some poor
Hindoo, who, with baseless dreams of heaven,
casts himself to perish in the waters. But glanc-
ing our eyes along the bank on which we rest,
what vegetable curiosity is this? A dancing
plant !

It is even so. Seated in a shady recess,—for

138 LIFE OF A TREE.

the plant loves not the unshorn brilliancy of the
sun’s rays, however much dependent on its heat,—
is the famous Desmodium, or Hedysarum gyrans.
Let us watch its movements. Its leaves are sub-
divided into two little oblong ones at the side,
and one large leaflet in the centre. The move-
ments take place in the little leaflets, the other
being less actively moved. They are of a very
odd description :— First, one of these little or-
gans rises by a series of little jumps like the
minute-hand of a watch, until it has reached a
certain height, then it begins to fall, and the
opposite one rises in its place, and so on alter-
nately; but the mid-leaflet is not altogether
quiet, we see it first move a little to the right,
then a little to the left. These motions are,
however, very gradual and even slow in compari-
son with the others. If we count the movements
of the little leaflets, they resemble, even in point
of time, the minute-hand motions of a watch, for
they are about sixty in the minute! During the
whole period of our stay by the side of this wonder-
ful plant, it has never ceased these dancing move-
ments; and though we were to linger there during
the night, and watch morning in, should we find

~

HAVE PLANTS SENSATION ? 139

it for a moment at rest? Neither night nor day,
nor youth nor age, affects the movements, and
they are only arrested by disease, cold, or death.
This singular instance of plant-motion is quite
without a parallel in the entire vegetable kingdom.

These facts cannot be explained by any one.
We know neither the mechanism of the move-
ment, nor the exciting cause thereof. In animals
there is a beautiful apparatus which can easily
be understood, consisting of muscles, bones, and
nerves, by means of which all the wondrous
movements of the animal frame are readily effected;
but no such, nor even similar apparatus, is to
be found in vegetables. The microscope may one
day tell us how they take place, but we fear it
will be some time ere this is accomplished.

Often, while pondering on such things as these,
or when beholding the fresh luxuriance of a vege-
table crowd after a new-falien shower,—a time
when every power of life seems awakened, and, as
one may say, we can ‘‘almostsee the plants grow,”
has the thought arisen, do these beautiful beings
enjoy anything like feeling: are they in any mea-
sure sensible of what goes on around them, whether,
for example, there is better food a little distance

140 LIFE OF A TREE.

off, or whether higher up in the air there is more
sun and less shade? Here again we are left in
darkness : Wordsworth, it is true, says,

“It is my faith that every flower
Enjoys the air it breathes.”

But science cannot prove the poet’s words to be
correct.

Are we then to consider our Tree as a being
without anything like instinct? No!—and we
think we can establish some sort of a claim for it
on this score, if not on the other, by relating some
remarkable incidents, which seem to lead us to the
conclusion that plants really have a lowand feeble
sort of instinct.

We may ask, indeed, had instinct nothing
to do with the potatoe stem in directing its strug-
gling efforts to reach the hole at which lght
poured into its dark prison? But the following
are far more striking cases. Travellers in the
Indian Archipelago have described a curious tree,
called the Screw-pine, which performs a very
interesting action. We have been eye-witnesses
to the same fact, and can therefore vouch for its
accuracy. The tree is supported a little way

A TREE PROPPING UP ITSELF. 141

from the ground by a number of thick roots,
which uphold the stem in the air: this curious

THE SCREW-PINE.

(The prop is seen at some height above the other roots.)

structure naturally makes the tree less able to
resist the strong efforts of the wind to throw it
down; and, wonderful to say, the tree seems to

142 LIFE OF A TREE.

be sensible of its own weak points. For if it
leans to one side at all, and thus becomes in any
way in danger of falling, it immediately puts
forth a root from that side of its stem, at some
height from the ground, and this reaching the
earth grows vigorously, and becomes a firm,
strong buttress to the tree, so as perfectly to
avoid the danger. This is nicely represented in
the accompanying cut. If a human architect
had been commissioned to prop up the tree, he
could not probably have managed it better.
Sometimes trees will actually send a root across
an abyss or chasm, on the one side of which they
may happen to be growing. After growing for
some time they begin to find a lack of food in the
spot where they are fixed; and, whether by in-
stinct or not, we cannot tell, but at any rate per-
ceiving that on the other side of the ravine there
is a good supply of rich earth, they send out a
pioneer in the shape of a root, which bridges over
the gulf, and in the event actually conveys along
its countless tubes the food it finds on the other
side, back to the parent tree. Often we may see
something of the same sort in our strawberry
beds. When one of the plants grows near the

A TREE'S SEARCH FOR FOOD. 143

walk, it will often put out a long wire-like
runner quite across the gravel-walk, and enter
the earth on the other side, where it begins to
put out an abundance. of roots. We frequently

A TREE IN SEARCH OF FOOD.

also read of plants stretching out their stems to a
pan of water, and as it were following it wherever
it is placed.

144 LIFE OF A TREE.

In the lower animals we consider it a sign of
instinct, if a creature avoids a certain kind of food
which is calculated to injure it if swallowed.
Shall we deny then instinct to the tree, when we
find it behave almost precisely in the same man-
ner? Dr. Daubeny has made a number of ex-
periments on this subject. He watered plants
for a long time with water containing in solution
a chemical substance likely to injure them, but
the plants refused to absorb the least trace of at;
nor could it be found that any had got even into
the inner tissues of the root. Even when watered
with coloured water of an innocent kind, they
seemed to have the power of absorbing the pure
water and leaving the colouring matter behind.

But, just as the instinct of the lower animals
often fails them, and they will take food which
may cause their death, so with trees and plants
also. Experiments, for instance, have been made
upon the sensitive plant by M. Macaire. A leaf
of it was placed in a cold solution of opium, and,
after remaining in it for a few hours, became quite
insensible to the sharpest concussion, it would
contract no more, it seemed overpowered as it
were with sleep, and soon died. Now such are

PLANTS KILLED BY POISON. 145

exactly the effects of this poison on an animal.
Prussic acid, one of the most terrible poisons
known, also paralysed the poor plant; and, how-
ever it might have been shaken, it refused to
shew any of these signs of sensitiveness, which
were previously manifest in it. Solutions of
other poisons produced much the same effect on
plants as they do upon animals; the poisoned
trees soon perishing and withering away.

Plants have also been exposed to different kinds
of gases, and it has been found that those which
destroy animal life, have the same effect upon
that of vegetables. Perhaps one of the reasons
why plants will not thrive in London may be,
that the smoky filthy air of the metropolis acts as
a sort of poison to these tender beings. Some-
thing of this kind must be the cause of their
drooping, withering, and dying, in spite of the
greatest attention paid to them, as soon as ever
they leave the pure and healthful atmosphere of
the country for that of London. In Paris less
impurity of the air exists, because there is little
or no coal burnt, the fuel being chiefly wood and
charcoal; and here we have often been struck
with the freshness of the flowers in poor persons’

L

146 LIFE OF A TREE.

windows. Just opposite the hotel where we
stayed for some time, was one of the prettiest
flower-decked windows in the world. Rich green
creepers clustered up each side of the window,
and met in a graceful arch above, from which
their painted blossoms hung elegantly down; and
on the window-sill was a box as full as it could
hold of all sorts of flowers, the sweet odour of
which wafted country remembrances into the
room at every breath of air.. All these plants
seemed as strong, green, and healthy, as if, in-
stead of growing in the very heart of the metro-
polis of the empire, they had been luxuriating
outside some cottage door deep in the country.
Mr. Ward, a surgeon in London, has contrived
a very pretty miniature conservatory, in which,
even in London, plants may be grown of a small
size, in all their country freshness. These cases
are made of glass, and are constructed so as to fit
down over the plants, and in a great measure
exclude the air. The plants are placed in some
good mould ina tin box with gravel at the bot-
tom, and are then properly watered once, and the
glass cover is put over them. They will now
grow luxuriantly, and do not require watering

WARD'S CASES. 147

again for a very long time, as the moisture con-
denses on the side of the glass, and runs down
to the earth again. Ferns and mosses grow in
beautiful clusters here, and when the boxes are
nicely made, they form one of the most beautiful
ornaments possible for a lady’s drawing-room.

One could-almost fancy it was a great conserva-
tory, so completely do the forms of some of the
plants often grown in these cases resemble those
of large trees.. Probably one great reason of the
success of this little contrivance is the fact, that
little of the external air can get into it to injure

148 LIFE OF A TREE.

the delicate inhabitants of this tiny vegetable
world.

But to return to our immediate subject. May
we not then put in a plea for the possession of a
sort of instinct for our tree? Undoubtedly, it is
nothing to be compared to that of animals; but
is it nothing at all? Surely the few instances we
have brought forward seem to say in loud tones,
that dim and indistinct as this faculty evidently is,
it is going too far to say it does not really exist.
If we admit the probability of its existence, what
interest does it not give to our contemplations of
the Life of a Tree! No longer do we speak of a
mere wooden machine, which Spring sets in mo-
tion, and Winter lays to rest. The tree is no
longer regarded as but a little above a rock or
a stone. Whether we look upon the favourite
plants of our own choice and under our own care,
or upon those that inhabit our gardens, or those
which form our woods and fields, we now see
vegetable beings, which even appear to enjoy a low
measure of happiness, to whom it is not an indif-
ferent thing whether the skies are ever fair and
unbeclouded, or frequently darkened with storms,
or dripping with rain. It is true they are unable

HEAT OF PLANTS. 149

very evidently to shew their sensations, if they
have any; but it is equally true, that some of the
lowest animal tribes are not superior to them in
this respect. If it has pleased God in their crea-
tion really to endow trees with this faculty, un-
doubtedly it is a gift of love, to enable even this
portion of His wondrous works to find happiness
in its being alive; and knowing how widely the
Great Creator has extended the power of enjoy-
ment among even the humblest created beings,
the supposition that it has been granted to plants
also, may be considered as not one of the most
improbable in the world.

Not only are we accustomed to think of plants
as insensible beings, but we are also apt to con-
sider them as not possessed of any heat proper to
themselves, like animal heat in the animal world.
And perhaps it can be shewn that this is an
erroneous impression, as well as the other. If
we expose a glass bottle full of water to a sharp
winter’s frost, even after taking the precaution of
covering it with flannel or straw, the water will,
in all probability, freeze, and burst the bottle ;
yet the stem of many a young tree exposed to the
same penetrating cold, and also charged with fluids

150 LIFE OF A TREE.

that would easily freeze, remains uninjured, and it
is found that only the young shoots are generally
frozen through, even in the severest frost. Surely,
then, the tree must have some source of warmth
which can enable it to resist the cold of a winter’s
night, and all the long frosts of that season too!
This may be very prettily shewn also in the
following simple manner. On a frosty day in
Spring, take a small piece of ice and lay it on the
bud of any tree which is just beginning to wake
from the Winter’s sleep, and place a similar piece
of ice ona piece of wood, close by the tree, so
that both pieces are in the same condition as to
external temperature. It will now be found that
the piece of ice on the bud will slowly melt away,
while that on the piece of wood remains unmelted.
Evidently, therefore, the tree is warmer than the
dead wood. Some experiments on this much
neglected subject, have shewn the interesting fact
that the tree is actually three or four degrees
of the thermometer warmer than the air sur-
rounding it.

M. de Saussure noticed the curious fact that
snow melts more quickly around the trunk of
living than around that of dead trees,—a circum-

DE CANDOLLE’S EXPLANATION, 151

stance which might be explained on the suppo-
sition that the living tree actually possessed a
power and source of internal heat. John Hunter
seemed to prove it still more satisfactorily; for he
caused a hole to be bored into the trunk of a tree,
and placing a thermometer in it, he found that
it stood two or three degrees higher than one
exposed to the air.

M. de Candolle has offered an ingenious ex-
planation of these singular facts. After mention-
ing the experiments of some other authors upon
the subject, in which it was found that thermo-
meters buried in the earth at the foot of the tree,
indicated the same temperature as the trunk of
the tree, he comes to the conclusion that it is
because under the surface of the earth the water
in the soil is actually warmer than the surface, as
it is well-known to be in Winter, and because
this water rises into the tree through the roots,
communicating its warmth to the wood through
which it passes, that therefore the interior of a
tree 1s warmer than the wintry air around it.
In other words, he believes that trees have no
source of internal heat of their own, but derive
their warmth from the soil in which they grow.

152 LIFE OF A TREE,

The subject, it must be acknowledged, is one of

great obscurity.

Arum Maculatum.

At the time of
flowering in some
trees and _ plants,
there is a very re-
markable evolution
of heat, which we
shall be better able
to account for. It
will surprise many
readers to learn that,
when some plants
are just expanding
their flowers, these
beautiful organs be-
came quite warm.
The curious plant
here figured, the
Arum, presents us
with one of the most
marked cases in
point. One of the
species growing in

the Isle of France was found, upon experiment,

THE CUCKOO-PINT. 153

to make a thermometer placed inside the fold at
the bottom of the flower, rise to the temperature
of 121°, while the warmth of the external air was
but 66°. M. de Saussure, in some experiments
on the flowers of the gourd, Bignonia, and others,
found the same results in smaller quantities ; and
others have with several other plants obtained an
accumulation of similar facts.

As must be evident, the heat disengaged is
soon lost in the air; the reader, therefore, must
not feel disappointed if he cannot succeed in
detecting it. The common Arum, or “ Cuckoo
Pint,” or as children call it, ‘‘ Lords and Ladies,”
very common on every hedge-bank, seems to offer
the best chance of success; but he will require
a very delicate thermometer even then, to find
out any notable increase of warmth in the flower,
and care must be taken that the experiment is
made just at the right time, when the flower is
expanding. Perhaps, if a fold or two of fine
flannel were wrapped around the flower, the little
thermometer being carefully plunged into the
heart of the flower, the rise of the mercury might
be made more apparent, as this would prevent
the external air from cooling the plant.

154: LIFE OF A TREE.

The cause of this singular phenomenon is well
ascertained. We have already seen that the
green parts of plants absorb carbonic-acid gas
under the influence of light: now, it is a remark-
able fact that flowers, on the contrary, drink in
pure oxygen gas; and it is found, that just in
proportion as a flower consumes this gas, its heat
rises or falls. Thus, while other flowers only
consume eight parts of oxygen, the Arum, in
which we have seen the heat was most manifest,
consumed thirty parts.* As chemists well know
that no substance can unite itself to oxygen gas,
without producing heat, this is without a doubt
the cause of the evolution of the heat in question.

Although the thin bright edge of the young
moon rises higher and higher, warning us that
while we are lingering to tell of all the cu-
riosities of and in connection with the tree’s
history, the hours are rolling on; yet the warm
still air of the midsummer evening, all fragrant
as it is with such a mixture of sweet odours as

* In a common fire all the heat we feel arises from the oxygen gas
of the air uniting itself to the coal; and though the heat of these
flowers is feeble, it nevertheless is due to the same cause, which is
indeed commonly called Combustion.

LUMINOSITY OF PLANTS, 155

only could arise from Nature’s own combinations,
has charms for us, which for a little while longer
will detain us in the open air.

What is that little pale glow of light resting
on that bed of marigolds, like the “ glory” on the
heads of saints, pictured by the old masters?
Can plants emit light? So strange is the idea
that unless actually witnesses of the phenomenon
ourselves, we could scarcely believe it true.
Nevertheless, there is the light. The marigolds
are undoubtedly the producers of it, for neither
glow-worms nor other luminous insects are to be
found. What have we to say, then, as to the
luminosity of plants ?

The Fungi, as we have already had occasion to
notice, are not unfrequently splendidly luminous ;
but, as we then saw, they are in other respects
the complete exceptions to the rest of plants.
The daughter of the great Botanist of Sweden,
Linnzus, appears first to have noticed this strange
phenomenon. She observed that the flowers of
the Nasturtium, the marigold, and others of an
orange-colour, emitted light at the close of a
warm Summer’s day. ‘The following singular fact
is even more striking :—‘‘ In the garden of the

156 LIFE OF A TREE.

Duke of Buckingham at Stowe, on the evening
of Friday, September 4, 1855, during a storm
of thunder and lightning accompanied by heavy
rain, the leaves of the flower called @nothera ma-
crocarpa, a bed of which was in the garden im-
mediately opposite the windows of the Manu-
script Library, were observed to be brilliantly
illuminated with phosphoric light. During the
intervals of the flashes of lightning, the night was
exceedingly dark, and nothing else could be dis-
tinguished in the gloom, except the bright light
upon the leaves of these flowers. The luminous
appearance continued uninterruptedly for a con-
siderable length of time, but did not appear to
resemble any electric effect.”

A more wonderful example than either of dings
' was brought before the notice of the Asiatic
Society of London. The luminous plant was
discovered near the foot of the hills in the
Madura district in Hindostan, by a native, who,
having been compelled by rain to take shelter
under a mass of wood in the jungle, was astonished
to find all the grass in the vicinity blazing with a
pale phosphorescent light. Even the dead frag-
ment presented to the Society, although not

THE FLOWERS. 157

luminous while dry, became so after it had been
wrapped in a wet cloth for some little time. The
piece then shone in the dark like a piece of phos-
phorus, or perhaps with more paleness of light,
more like dead fish or rotten wood. Dr. Lindley
says: ‘‘ We advise gardeners to be on the look-
out for this phenomenon, and to examine all such
root-stocks as they may have in their possession,
in the hope of finding it. Plants habitually
luminous, and constantly so at night, and retain-
ing their properties years after they are dead, and
capable of being cultivated as this Madras plant
most certainly is, would form quite a new feature
in our gardens, and are well worth any degree of
trouble that may attend their discovery.”

Botanists have not come to any agreement yet
as to the causes of luminosity in plants. The
light of decaying wood is due to chemical decom-
position, but it does not appear that the instances
of luminosity just narrated are to be explained
in the same way. It has been supposed that
occasionally they are connected with electricity.

Our next visit to the tree must be by daylight,
if we would learn anything of the functions of
those sweet-smelling organs, the flowers.

158 LIFE OF A TREE.

On examining a flower, we find there are
generally three separate parts of it which deserve
our notice. First, there are the beautifully tinged
outer leaves, called sepa/s, and inner ones, called
petals. Secondly, there are a number of delicate
little thread-like bodies, called stamens, with little
yellow pieces on their tops, called anthers. And,
thirdly, in the middle, is an upright little piece,
called a style, bearing a head called a stigma ; and
a swelled part at the bottom, called the ovary, or
receptacle for the seeds. All these can be very
nicely seen in the geranium, or in the large
white lily growing in our gardens. They are also
clearly shewn in the cut.

Now, in order to perfect the seed of the plant,
and so to furnish mankind with the means of

THE POLLEN. 159

srowing many more plants of a similar description,
it is necessary that certain processes should take
place in the flower, which are very simple and
interesting. If the little pieces we have called
anthers are carefully examined, particularly if
they are looked at through a small magnifying
glass, they will be found to be sprinkled over
with an immense number of very small grains,
which to the eye look like so much yellow
powder: this is called pollen. Before the little
seeds placed in the ovary can be ripened or made
fit to grow, it is necessary that these little yellow
grains on the anthers should fall upon the piece
called the stigma; and could we watch with the
naked eye the events which take place, we should
find that this actually comes to pass. After
falling there the yellow pollen grains have been
found to put forth a little tube each, which
pierces the tender cells of the stigma, and then
seems to enter into the seeds contained in the
receptacle or ovary below.

There are, however, many plants the flowers of
which do not contain both stamens and a stigma.
In these, the stamens are in one flower, and the
stigma in another; and these may even grow on

160 LIFE OF A TREE,

separate trees. ‘Then comes the question, How
is the yellow powder to be carried from the one
to the other? Unless it is conveyed in some way
or other, the seeds will never ripen. This diffi-
culty, in common with every other of a similar
kind in creation, has been beautifully provided
for by God, who, when He created the world,
and its animal and vegetable tenants, knew the
**end from the beginning,” and ordered all things
so as to accomplish their proper parts in His
all-wise plan.

The answer may well excite our surprise. The
important yellow powder is carried from the one
to the other, chiefly either by the winds or by
insects, and sometimes by man himself. Doubtless
the hairy coat of the industrious bee was a special
contrivance, intended, among others, to effect this
end, which is of so much consequence to plants.
Mark how the ever-industrious insect plunges
into a flower, and is for a while lost in its painted
recesses. After buzzing about for a few seconds,
see her emerge as dusty as a miller, all powdered
over with the yellow pollen. Away she flies.
The next flower to which she wings her way, is
perhaps one that only possesses a stigma; and

A DATE FAMINE, 161

here, in entering, she rubs her dust-covered coat
upon this organ, overlaying it with the very
powder which is requisite for it.

When the wind is the pollen-carrier, it is in
consequence of the pollen- grains being so light
as to float upon a gentle breeze, and they are
thus conveyed to their proper destination.

Sometimes, however, man is the instrument.
The Date-palm is just one of those trees in which
the flowers are either of one kind or of the other,
and unless the pollen-grains of the one are in
some manner or other conveyed to the flowers of
the other, no dates would be produced ; for, as we
have just remarked, the seed will not ripen unless
this is the case. Now a failure of the Date-har-
vest would be, to the inhabitants of Lower Egypt,
as serious a calamity as the failure of our Wheat-
crops to us, since they subsist mainly on this
fruit. They therefore go and pluck the flowers
bearing pollen, and climbing the trees of the oppo-
site kind, sprinkle the yellow dust over the flowers
which possess stigmas. After this, they are toler-
ably sure of a fruitful harvest. In the year 1800,
when the French armies invaded that country,
the wretched natives fled away in all directions,

M

162 LIFE OF A TREE.

and could not therefore perform this necessary
operation. The sad result was, that all the Date-
palms in Lower Egypt were barren that year, and
a Date-famine was the mournful addition to the
horrors of war. Our gardeners often perform the
same manoeuvre when they wish to increase the
fruitfulness of the cucumber or gourd.

De Candolle tells us of a pretty little French
féte, which had its origin in this operation. It
was at Saint Valery-en-Somme that there grew
an apple-tree, which by some singular accident,
instead of producing flowers containing both the
pollen-grains and the stigmas, only bore flowers
with stigmas, and was therefore barren for some
time. At length the cause was discovered, and
it was proposed to take the flowers of another
apple-tree, and sprinkle the dust over those of
this tree. ‘The result was crowned with success,
and on its being repeated every year, the little
féte was established; and amid the usual ac-
companiments of a little procession, music and
dancing, and the merriment of all the young men
and maidens of the village, the branches were
waved over the tree, and they returned again to
the village. ‘The name of this festivity was Faire

THE FRUIT. 163

sa Pomme, the literal English of which would be
*‘ making one’s apple.” We should perhaps have
called it, had it been one of our popular customs,
““The Apple Feast.”

When, in the flower, the pollen has been thus
applied to the stigma, a great and often very
sudden change takes place in the flower. As if
conscious that the end of its existence was now
accomplished, it shrivels up, withers, and gene-
rally drops from the tree, shedding its beautiful
petals upon the ground to rot and crumble into
dust. The ovary then swells, and with its con-
tained seeds, becomes the fruit.

As every one knows, the fruit undergoes great
changes as it ripens. If we look at an apple just
as it begins to be formed, we find it to be a very
different object from that which, when ripe, is
perhaps our favourite dish at dessert. Now, it is
a hard, woody, sour, or tasteless knob of tissue,
which we are well content to let remain on the
tree until it lose all these characters. Then, it
has become a juicy, soft, well-formed, and de-
liciously flavoured substance, tinged in many
instances, as in the American Lady Apple re-
cently introduced into our fruiterers’ shops, with

164 LIFE OF A TREE.

the most brilliant contrasts of the richest colours,
golden and deep red. Disregarding other changes,
the most remarkable alteration to which we are
called to attend, is that which we all prize so
much, the change from intense sourness to a
delightful sweetness of taste. How is this ac-
complished ?

It has been found, that while the fruit is green
it acts upon the air in the same manner as the
leaves,—that is, it absorbs carbonic acid during
the day, and exhales it at night. As it becomes
more and more ripe, peculiar chemical changes
take place in it, and the juice it contains gradu-
ally becomes more and more charged with sugar,
until at length it is full ripe, and it then loses
its connection with the tree, and falls to the
ground,

After it 1s ripened, in a certain time it begins
to rot. The oxygen of the air acts upon it, and
reduces it to a soft pulpy mass; except the seeds
which are contained within, and which seem to
have been beautifully endowed with a peculiar
power of resisting this change. In the common
medlar, this rotting is commonly allowed to take
place, and the fruit is not eaten until it has

PRESERVATION OF, BY COLD. 165

quite rotted ;* but most other fruits are spoiled
for human consumption by the change.

If we can shut out the oxygen of the air,
therefore, we shall generally be able to preserve
our fruits for a considerable time; and our house-
keepers are acquainted with many ways of so
doing, all of which have this particular object
in view, although probably the sczence of their
operations may be unknown to them. ‘Thus a
favourite plan is, to put half-ripe fruit into a dry
bottle, cork it up, wax over the cork, and bury
it in a garden. Many a time have we thus the
pleasure of seeing the fruit of the last season
come up to table in different forms of cookery,
as fresh as if just plucked from the trees. An-
other plan is, to put at the bottom of a bottle
a paste formed of lime, sulphate of iron, and
water, and afterwards put in the fruit, but with
some little contrivance, such as a layer of cork
over the paste, to keep it from touching the
fruit. The bottles must then be well corked
and waxed over. This paste acts in a che-
mical manner on the air contained in the bot-
tle, and takes from it all its oxygen gas, so

* This change is also called ‘* Bletting.”

166 LIFE OF A TREE.

that there is none left to attack and injure the
fruit.

Both fruit and flowers may be preserved also
by means of cold, which seems to act by prevent-
ing chemical decomposition from taking place ; as
it is well known that chemical changes of this
kind require a certain degree of warmth before
they can be set going.* In France, where flowers
in particular are great favourites with the people,
they are preserved in icehouses. They are gathered
before they have expanded, and are put into
glazed jars perfectly clean and dry, and over
which a tight capping of oiled silk is to be tied, so
as to exclude the air. These jars are then placed
in the antichamber of an icehouse, where the tem-
perature is nearly about that at which ice melts,
for were it colder the flowers would be frozen.
When wanted, they may be made to unfold their
blossoms by plunging them into luke-warm water ;
the fibres soon resume their natural pliancy, and
if now placed in a warm room, the stems being
plunged in tepid water, they will expand and
appear as fresh as if but lately culled from the
garden or the hot-house.

* Apples are sent from America to the East Indies preserved in ice.

BREAD FROM PINE-TREES. 167

Autumn has now come. The tree forms no
more wood, and having, as we have seen, in suc-
cession put forth its leaves, flowers, and fruit, little
now remains for us to say concerning it, before
the arrival of the Winter of the natural season,
and of the Winter of vegetable old age; but this
little is both important and interesting. After
the month of August, trees form no more the
woody bands, of which we have before spoken,
and which form the concentric ring-marks noticed
at the commencement of this chapter. ‘The tree
is not, however, inactive. Its leaves still continue
in activity, though with diminished powers; but
instead of forming wood, they now form starch
out of the food they obtain from the air and. the
soil. This starch is stored up in cells through-
out the whole tree, sometimes accumulating more
in one part than in another. It is intended not
for the use of the tree itself, but generally for
the nourishment of the young leaves and branches
of the next Spring.

The starch thus deposited in the trunk of the
tree, sometimes is extracted by man for the pur-
pose of food. Thus we are told that bread is
made from the bark of pine-trees in Sweden

168 LIFE OF A TREE.

during famines. The pith of old palm-trees is
often so rich in a variety of starch, well known
to all under the title of sago, that the inhabi-
tants of the countries where it grows fear little
the effects of a famine of other produce, if they
can only cut down enough trees; for these
supply them abundantly with good, cheap, and
nourishing food. ‘The finest sago is prepared
from palm-trees forming immense forests on nearly
all the Moluccas, and so rich in sago, that each
tree is reckoned to furnish from six hundred
to eight hundred pounds of this useful article;
other palm-trees, after yielding an enormous
amount of sugar from their sap, are cut down
when no more will run out, and, by proper
means being employed, as much as from a hun-
dred and fifty to two hundred pounds of sago
may be obtained from the trunk.

Here let us close our chapter on the history of

the Adult Tree.

edo
Vi bieviw

THE OLD AGE OF THE TREE,

THE OLD AGE OF THE TRERF. 171

CHAPTER IV.
THE OLD AGE OF THE TREE.

Five hundred years have gone by, yet the Tree
stands. A thousand times have the storms of
heaven wrestled with its sturdy trunk and wide-
spread limbs, while the earth trembled at the
contest ; five hundred Winters have bent down
its long and crooked branches with a huge load
of snow, and more times than we can mention
have huge branches withered, died, and dropped
off. Yet the Tree stands. But how altered in
its aspect from the tree as it first appeared before
us, a tender, fragile, graceful sapling, and then
aripe young tree! All the lines of young grace
and beauty are gone, and with them the pliancy of
the sap-charged stem. The great trunk is now a
great tower of wood, covered with huge knots and
warts, and furrowed into deep channels, down

172 LIFE OF A TREE.

which the rain gushes violently after every shower
of long continuance. The great branches which
jut out from its sides, are full-grown trees in
dimensions, and as thick as the united bodies
of two or three men; and every here and there
we may see a huge round stump all covered over
with mould, and perhaps forming a little garden
of itself, bringing forth divers kinds of weeds
and grass high up in the air, where former
branches grew, and were cut off by the woodman.
The earth round about is all knotty and raised
up into mimic hills by the great swollen roots
beneath, some of which are, indeed, bare and
exposed, and are polished with the gambols of
children playing about them, and by the rubbing
of the beasts of the field against them, when they
come hither for shelter from the mid-day heats.
A terrible and majestic object is that great old
tree in the Winter time, particularly when it is
seen in a snow-storm. Then to watch it at a
distance,—to see the big, burly branches fight,
with their hundred arms, with the whistling wind
which pelts it and blinds it with a cloud of snow,
—to see it stand without a quiver in its stalwart
trunk, when every tree of the field bows submis-

THE OLD AGE OF THE TREE. lia

sively to the invisible giant of air, when the tall
poplars come lowest of all, and feel, together
with mighty ones of our own race in the whirl-
winds of life, what a dangerous thing it is to
carry it loftily in the world,—and to hear every
now and then the crash which tells that some
rotten-hearted member has been snapped off in
the fight,—this is something worth experienc-
ing !

Yet the Tree stands,—and lives a hale and
vigorous tree still. Three hundred years agone
old men out of the village used to come and poke
the old trunk with their sticks, and prophesy,
** Ay, ay, it couldn’t last much longer.” <A
hundred years later, their children’s children,
themselves white with age, used to do the same;
and in their turn were laid in the grave. And
now a hundred years later still, behold it living
and strong, while the old men, and generation
after generation of their descendants, are crumbled
into dust, and their grave can scarcely be found
in the moss-covered corner of the churchyard.

That it is really and truly alive, the return of
Spring will not suffer us to doubt. Green leaves,
as fresh and young as ever dangled from _ its

174: LIFE OF A TREE.

branches in its early time of youth, are seen for
the five hundredth time dancing in the brisk air;
their tone deepens with the advancing year, and
all their functions go on as well and vigorously
as ever. In Scripture language ‘‘it takes deep
root, it fills the land. The hills are covered’
with the shadow of it, and its boughs are like
the goodly cedars. It sends out its boughs to
the sea, and its branches to the river.”* HEven
in its old age it is *‘ fat and flourishing.’’}

But let us take a nearer view of this apparently
hale old tree. Look at it in the Frontispiece
too: approaching it on another side, it appears
a mighty, solid mass of timber; but on this, we
perceive a great hole completely through the tree,
large enough for the entrance of two or three
men. We may step inside the tree, and there is
room for a party of seven or eight in its capacious
recess. The shepherd well knows the spot, and
often drives his flock to lie down under its broad
shadow, while he himself ensconces himself in the
wooden room within the tree; leaving his dog as
sentinel and guard, whilst he betakes himself to a
quiet sleep. On touching the sides of this singu-

= Psalm Ixxx. 9, 10, 11. + Psalm xcii. 14,

~

ROTTENNESS WITHIN. VO

Jar apartment, we find the wood all soft and rot-
ten, and we may break large pieces off, even with
the unassisted hands. On rubbing these pieces
between our fingers, they crumble to powder.
Had we not seen the green clothing of the
vigorous branches outside, we could have guessed
at nothing less, on contemplating the interior,
than that the old tree was in reality dead. Out-
side, truly, there is a fair show of strength and
vigour; but to look within, there is nothing
but rottenness and fast advancing death. How
can this be? Can the tree be dead and yet alive
at the same time ?

This singular circumstance may be accounted
for without difficulty. We have already seen,
that from the very first, in the trees called
Exogens, the different concentric layers of wood
were laid on to the tree from without: by this
it is to be understood that the new wood was
always added to the outside, it being deposited
just underneath the bark. Consequently the
process of growth is chiefly on the outside of
a tree; the inner portions of it being of use
chiefly to give stability to the structure, and
to circulate the various nutritious juices, convey-

176 LIFE OF A TREE.

ing them from place to place in the stem,
Hence, it is not actually necessary that the
trunk should be perfectly solid, so long as
enough wood remains entire to perform these
two functions. The mere fact, therefore, that
the trunk is hollow and time-eaten, even to a
very large extent in the centre, is of but little
consequence to the life of the tree. As it is well
known that a hollow pillar is stronger than a
solid one, there is no fear on the score of
weakness, unless the internal decay proceeds at
a very rapid rate. And so long as a sufficient
amount of woody tissue remains in the circum-
ference to carry on its usual duties, there is
little fear of the death of the tree. The branches
with their ten thousand workmen, the leaves,
are continually condensing fresh wood from the
very enemy the tree has most to fear—even
the tempestuous air. Not a wind that howls
through its boughs, rustling with the quaking
leaves, but parts with some portion of its
contents to contribute to the strength and
endurance of the venerable trunk, with which
it has so long vainly contested. Not a drop
of rain that falls in pitiless fury upon its aged

LENGTH OF VEGETABLE LIFE. be ar

head that does not find its way into its wide-
spreading roots and enter into the various tissues
to nourish and support them all. The once
solid fortress whose barely recognizable ruins
lie yonder half hidden with grass and weeds,
five hundred years ago might have laughed to
scorn the idea that the young sapling, then
rising from the soil, was destined better to
brave the tooth of time than it, although built
of masses of rogk, cemented with consummate
art, and bound together with clamps of iron.
And wind and rain might have thought the
fortress a far more invincible object of attack
than the pliant young tree. But wind and rain
brought nothing with them to add to the fortress,
and never left it without taking much away
that could never be restored again. Time went
by: the strong-built castle grew crazier and
began to crumble away; the hard cement was
washed out of its joints, and the great stones
grew insecure in their places, while the tree
lived on, and year by year increased in stature
and in strength, until its topmost boughs waved
high above the castle-tower. Three centuries
had not elapsed: the fortress was in ruins;
N

178 LIFE OF A TREE.

and claimed as its only occupants the plants
which sprung up in its once merry hall, and
the cawing rooks, which took a particular fancy
to live in its smokeless chimneys. Yet the tree
lived on, and the wind and rain fought as before
with a foe to whom they themselves communi-
cated strength and resistance. Now where is
the castle-tower — where the massive wall, the
lady-chamber, and the banquet-hall? The green
and smiling earth covers their remains; and
the great tree looks mournfully and in vain
for the mere remnant of a building, that in its
youth seemed strong enough to last out all
time !

Let this thought give courage and strength
to ourselves. Has God so strengthened the trees
of the field and enabled them to gather force
out of the very storms which threaten to up-
root them, and is He less mindful of us, his
creatures? No! if it be so that we are one
with Christ, joined to and abiding in Him,
‘“ who is the True Vine,” we are safe. A thou-
sand storms may rage around us, they cannot
tear us from Him: nay more, they themselves
cause us to cling closer to’ Him; and thus,

AGE OF EXOGENS. 179

when the fury of the adversary is “as a storm
against a wall,” far from hurling us to the
earth again, it is the very means by which our
strength comes to us, and is increased continually
in us. But be it also ever ours to remember
that ‘we bear not the root, but the root us;”
and that the root which bears us, is none other
than our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ; for,
severed from Him, we are, and can do, nothing.

It appears probable that there is really no
fixed limit to the age of a tree formed on the
Exogenous plan, where the youngest part is out-
side; for with every year, it continues te become
strengthened with new and young material so
as to counterbalance the decay which goes on
in its interior. Notwithstanding this source and
cause of perpetual youth, the events and acci-
dents of rolling years write upon the stoutest of
the vegetable children of the earth, “‘ Thou, too,
art mortal.” The change which influences every
earthly object affects the tree likewise; and as
we shall see in our concluding chapter, the period
of its death, sooner or later, certainly arrives.

In the trees which are youngest in their
centre,—that is, the new additions to which are

180 LIFE OF A TREE.

made, not ‘as in Exogens to the outside, but
to the interior of the stem, and hence called
Endogens, or growers from within,—Exogens
being growers from without,—in Endogens then,
it is easy to imagine that a limit to their growth
may exist. Let us explain this matter in the
following homely way. Suppose we had a hollow
wooden cylinder before us, such as a_ barrel
with the ends knocked out. Now, plainly, we
might put as many large barrels as we chose
over and outside the first, until we could only
put no more because no one could make us a
barrel large enough to fit over the last. But
suppose we tried to cram the barrel full of rods
or poles, we should succeed in getting a certain
number in, but with all our efforts we could
not get more, simply because the barrel would
not stretch out larger. ‘This circumstance then
alone would limit us in our attempts to add to
the size of the barrel; while it 1s manifest in the
other case that there is no limit to its increase in
size, but our inability to obtain a larger outside
barrel. Had we the power to make barrels of
any size, we might go on fitting one over another,
until the great tun of Heidelberg, about which

LIMITED LIFE OF ENDOGENS. 181

we have all read so much, would be a mere
pigmy to the huge cask which would fit over
our accumulated barrels. If we were to make a
section of all these
barrels completely
across, and look at
the cut extremities,
we should see, as is

¥ DIAGRAM OF AN DIAGRAM OF AN
represented in the EXOGEN. ENDOGEN.
adjoining cut, the almost exact resemblance of
the cross-cut stem of an Exogen; and doing
the same with the barrel, into the interior of
which we had thrust a number of hollow tubes
or rods, we have something of the resemblance
of an Endogen. The drawing will, we trust,
make this very easy of comprehension.

Even if we suppose the outer case of the
Endogen to be in some measure able to expand,
yet it is evident there would be a limit even to
that, and beyond this it could not stretch. Yet
while it is true theoretically that a limit to
the life of Endogens must or may exist, it is
also true that we are unable to fix it in the
present state of our knowledge on this subject.
Therefore our wisest course is to say, that

182 LIFE OF A TREE.

Exogens have the best chances of the longest
life, and Endogens the worst; because in the
former there is nothing to forbid their increase
to any size whatever, and in the latter there is
a decided limit set by their singular mode of
growth, and the hard and resisting nature of
the outer case of the stem.

Some astonishing instances of vegetable old
age are on record.* John Evelyn, who used
to be very much attached to trees, gardens, and
country things in general, has mentioned several
astonishing instances in his famous book called
Sylva.” We will not quite vouch for the
perfect accuracy of all that he relates, but it
will perhaps be interesting to most of our readers
to be made acquainted with some of these vege-
table marvels. Thus he tells us that one of the
Consuls and Governors of Lycia was in the habit
of feasting his whole retinue in the hollow of
a great Plane-tree. This enormous tree is said
to have had a room in it of eighty feet in cir-

* For the method of ascertaining the age of trees, refer back to
p- 103. It must be added, however, that too much stress must not be
laid upon the number of rings as an index of the age of the tree in all
instances,

GREAT LIME-TREE. 183

cumference, which was adorned like one of the
rooms in the Consul’s palace, and enlivened
with beautiful fountains of water: it had also
stately seats and tables variously arranged in it.
Evelyn further tells us, that there was, at some
place in Gloucestershire, an oak-tree, which
having become naturally hollow, was further
excavated by human art and converted into a
wainscoted room, which had windows’ with
pleasant prospects on different sides of the
tree, and was provided with comfortable seats
within. How strange the sensation must have
been to have taken tea with a party of friends
inside a great living tree! From him also we
learn, that in a time of war there was an oak in
Westphalia which was resorted to by a band
of warriors, who successfully garrisoned and
defended it, using it as a castle and fort.
With our improved modes of warfare, such a
refuge would have been but of little avail.
Perhaps one of the most remarkable old trees
is the celebrated Lime-tree at Neustadt, in the
Duchy of Wurtemburg. So far back as the
year 1229—six hundred and twenty years ago,
this Lime-tree was already a very great and

184 LIFE OF A TREE.

well-known tree, for, according to ancient docu-
ments, the new city was built after the de-
struction of the old one, which was called
Helmbundt, “near the great Lime-tree.” The
city was consequently often called ‘“ Neustadt
near the great Lime-tree!” One would have
thought ‘‘the Lime-tree near Neustadt,” a more
correct expression, but such even then was the
size of the tree, and so remarkable was it on
that account, that the former designation, which
was perhaps at first a bon mot, came to be used
with complete propriety. It is mentioned nearly
two hundred years later in an old poem which
describes it as a great tree, the wide-spread
branches of which were supported on siaty-seven
pillars of stone, placed there by different persons.
Two hundred years later still, the number of
pillars which sustained it was eighty-two, and
at the present time is upwards of one hundred !
The tree is divided at the summit into two
immense branches, one of which is upwards
of one hundred feet in length; the other was
injured in a storm in 1773.

In 1664 Evelyn tells us that the trunk of this

huge tree measured nearly forty feet in circum-

A TREE 1150 YEARS OLD. 185

ference. Calculations have been made of the
probable age of this vegetable giant, and it
seems pretty certain that it cannot be much
younger than eleven hundred and fifty years!
It appears that at various times, parts of this
huge tree have suffered serious injury; as Evelyn
informs us that it had been, before his time,
much larger than it was even then, for many
ruined pillars were visible which had once up-
held its massive boughs.

At Schalouse in Switzerland there is another
famous Lime-tree, “ under which is a bower com-
posed of its branches, capable of containing three
hundred persons sitting at ease. It has also a
fountain set about with many tables, formed only
of the boughs, to which they ascend by steps,
all kept so accurately, and so very thick, that the
sun looks never into it.”* It is related by the
same author, that the Emperor Frederic III., gave
once a magnificent repast upon a table which was
a solid block of a tree, and was five-and-twenty
feet in diameter, and of proportionate thickness.

The Chestnut-tree sometimes attains a great
age and an enormous size. ‘There are some large

* Evelyn “ Discourse on Forest Trees.”

186 LIFE OF A TREE.

specimens in England, but none of these will
compare with the great Chestnut of Mount Etna,
called the Chestnut of the Hundred Horses.
This tree is described by a modern traveller,
who surmounted many obstacles in order to
get to see it. His first idea was that it was
formed of five large trees grown into one; but
upon some careful examination, he became satis-
fied that they had formerly been united into
one solid stem, and on measuring the hollow
within, he found it two hundred and four feet
round! There has been much disputing about
this great Chestnut; and some men of science are
still inclined to believe that its size has been
exaggerated, and that it is really three trees,
and not a single trunk. It has been said of it
that it contained as much timber as was necessary
to build a palace !

In a valley near Constantinople an immense
Plane-tree has been described, which renders the
tale told of the Lycian Consul not so improbable
as it might at first sight appear to be. This tree
is described as being ninety feet high, and the
circumference of the trunk as one hundred and
fifteen feet. The trunk is hollow on a level

OLD YEW-TREES. 187

with the soil; and on measuring the dark wooden
abyss within, it was found to be eighty feet in
circumference. Supposing that the trunk had
been solid, a table cut out of its trunk near the
ground would have measured at least thirty-five
feet across, and would have comfortably dined,
allowing two feet to each person, upwards of fifty
people. Altogether the tree covered a space of
five hundred square feet. This tree may possibly
be about two thousand years old!

The mournful Yew-tree is also famous for
its great age. ‘* Indeed,” says Mr. Strutt in his
work on the Forest Trees of Britain, ‘‘it can
scarcely ever be said to die, new shoots perpetu-
ally springing out from the old and withered
trunk.” The Yew-trees at Fountains Abbey near
Ripon, are at least seven hundred years old,
probably several centuries older. For we read
that when the monks were waiting the comple-
tion of the building of the abbey, they took
shelter under these Yew-trees, and there re-
mained protected only by their dense foliage
from storm and rain until the monastery was
completed, when they, probably with no great
reluctance, quitted the shelter of the trees for

188 LIFE OF A TREE.

the warmer and more comfortable halls and
refectory of the monastery. By counting up
the concentric lines on the section of the trunk
of the Yew-tree, it has been found that they
increase about the twelfth of an inch a year
in diameter. Therefore by our ascertaining
simply the diameter of the trunk, we are able
to tell pretty accurately the antiquity of the
entire tree. It has been supposed that these
Yews are about twelve hundred years old.

The Fortingal Yew, represented in the accom-
panying cut, is one of the largest and oldest
trees in Scotland. It stands in the churchyard
of Fortingal, a beautiful district lymg in the
heart of the Grampian mountains. This pro-
digious tree, as we are informed, was measured
by the traveller Pennant, and found to be fifty-
six feet and a half in circumference. It is now
decayed down to the ground, and, as is shewn
in the cut, there is sufficient space in its interior
for the passage of a funeral procession, it being
an old custom for the dead to be carried through
the hollow, solemn-looking tree, in their passage
to the resting-place where the rich and the poor
rest together, and where the last remains of our

"MHA TVYONILUOA AHL

190 LIFE OF A TREE,

mortal bodies shall slumber until the morning of
the Resurrection. This Yew-tree is supposed to
be about two thousand six hundred years old.
The most ancient Yew in England is in the
churchyard of the village of Braburn in Kent.
In 1660, this venerable tree was fifty-eight feet
nine inches in circumference. At present, if it still
exists, it must be about three thousand years old!
As the voyager to Eastern India sails past
Cape de Verd (literally, the Green Cape), he
discovers, even while yet far from land, numerous
great masses of vegetation which clothe the Cape
in thick profusion, and from the verdant look
they communicate to it, have in all probability
suggested its title. These masses of green are
enormous trees, known as Adansonias or Baobab
trees. They were first discovered by a French
traveller of the name of Adanson, and have
been called after him. Truly they are of an
enormous size! Adanson was astonished at their
proportions, and still more so at what he thought
was their probable age,—five thousand one
hundred and fifty years. Some of the trunks
had a diameter or cross-measurement of thirty
feet, and a circumference of ninety. Other

BAOBAB-TREES. 191

travellers have found yet larger trees, and one
is described as having a circumference of up-
wards of one hundred feet. The great branches
are themselves like large trees, and spread out
from the trunk with great regularity all round.

BAOBAB-TREE.

In the centre a branch rises up straight, and
thus by the intermingling of innumerable boughs,
the immense tree comes to wear something of
the look of a colossal mushroom, or its top re-

192 LIFE OF A TREE.

sembles that of a hay-stack. The fruit of this
tree is called Monkey Bread. It is said to be
agreeably acid, and to form a pleasant article of
dessert when mixed with a little sugar.

The Cedars of Lebanon have long been famous,
and, as will be well remembered, are frequently
mentioned in Scripture. Some of these trees
on the tops of the oldest mountains, had attained
avery great age, and were examined by the old
traveller Maundrell. The circumference of one
measured by him was between thirty and forty
feet, and its great branches were each of them
as large as an ordinary sized tree. It was
supposed they were from one to two thousand
years old; but it is more probable that they
were not much more than eight hundred years.
Since he visited them all the ancient trees have
been cut down, and now Mount Lebanon can
only boast of some younger trees of the same
description.

We are told by Evelyn that St. Jerome actually
saw in his day the Sycamore-tree up which Zac-
cheus climbed to catch a glimpse of our Saviour
as he passed by. As St. Jerome lived in the
fourth century, the tree, if his statement is cor-

CEDARS OF LEBANON, 193

rect, must have been then about four hundred
years old. But we must warn our young readers
that these legends are not always—indeed, not
often—correct, and that there is, therefore, some
doubt whether the Sycamore-tree in question
was that same tree up which Zaccheus climbed
because he was short of stature.

A French newspaper, some years ago, contained
the account of the felling of an old Oak in the
forest of Ardennes. ‘The woodsman who cut it
down was surprised to find in its interior some
remains of sacrificial vessels, and some ancient
medals or coins. ‘The date of these coins was
upwards of two hundred and seventy years pre-
vious to the foundation of the City of Rome. It
was calculated from these data, that the tree
could not be less than three thousand six hundred
years old. M.de Candolle questions the accuracy
of this calculation, and says that the utmost we
can assume is that the coins were probably hid in
the trunk at the invasion of the Goths, when
coins were often largely secreted ; and this would
make this venerable oak at least fifteen or sixteen
hundred years old.

_ The Cypress likewise attains a great age. This
Oo

194: LIFE OF A TREE.

tree is very abundant, and reaches its utmost size
in America, particularly in Mexico. In the
Magazine of Natural History, an account is
given of one which is known by the name of the
Cypress of Montezuma, because it was, at the
time when that prince ascended the throne, in
full vigour and luxuriance of growth. Its cir-
cumference at the bottom of the trunk is forty-
one feet, and it still exists flourishing and ve-
nerated in its old age. The Baron Humboldt
speaks of one of the same species, which is one
hundred and eighteen feet in circumference; but
it seemed to him that this monstrous trunk was
composed of three trees, which had grown into
one. This tree is still flourishing near Oaxaca,
surrounded by five or six others of great size.
The large tree is one hundred feet high. It is re-
lated that the army of Cortes once reclined under
its shadow. It is highly venerated by the super-
stitious natives of Mexico. This Cypress has been
supposed to be at least four thousand years old.
The celebrated traveller Von Martius, in one
of his beautiful botanical works, has a passage
which is so striking that we shall transfer it to
these pages. The learned traveller is speaking

VEGETABLE GIANTS. 195

of the great Locust-trees which exist in the old
woods of Brazil. ‘The place where these pro-

LOCUST-TREES OF BRAZIL.

digious trees were found, appeared to me as if
it were the portals .of a magnificent temple, not

196 LIFE OF A TREE.

constructed by the hands of man, but by the
Deity himself, as if to awe the mind of the
spectator with a holy dread of His own presence.
Never before had I beheld such enormous trunks,
—they looked more like living rocks than trees ;
for it was only on the pinnacle of their bare and
naked bark that foliage could be discovered, and
that at such a distance from the eye that the
forms of the leaves could not be made out, Fif-
teen Indians with outstretched arms could only
just embrace one of them. At the bottom they
were eighty-four feet in circumference, and sixty
feet where the boles became cylindrical.” By
counting the concentric rings of such parts as
were accessible, he arrived at the conclusion that
they were of the age of Homer, and three hundred
and thirty-two years old in the days of Pytha-
goras. One of his estimates reduced their age to
two thousand and fifty-two years, while another
carried it up to four thousand one hundred and
four; from which he argues that the trees can-
not but date far beyond the time of our Saviour.
Their colossal appearance is well shewn in the
cut, a small portion of the lower part of the
trunk only being represented.

DRAGON-TREE OF OROTAVA. 197

The famous dragon-tree of Orotava, a sea-
port town in the Isle of Teneriffe, has been re-
peatedly mentioned by travellers, on account of
its immense age and size. It is thus described
by Humboldt. ‘This gigantic tree is now in
the garden of a M. Franchi, in the little town
of Orotava, one of the most delicious spots in
the civilized world. In June 1799, when we
ascended the peak of Teneriffe, we found this
enormous tree then possessing a circumference
of forty-five feet a little above the root. Tra-
dition relates that this dragon-tree was worshipped
by the Guanches the original inhabitants of the
island; and that in 1402, it was as large and as
hollow as when we saw it. When we call to
mind that the dragon-tree is of a very slow
growth, we may readily conceive that this Oro-
tava giant is extremely old. Without doubt it
is, next to the Baobab-tree, one of the oldest
inhabitants of our planet.” From time to time this
great tree has seriously suffered from the effects of
hurricanes. In July 1819, a large portion of its
top was blown down. A traveller who visited it
in 1837, states that it was still in existence,
growing in a neglected cabbage-garden, uncon-

i‘

198 LIFE OF A TREE.

nected with houses. M. Berthelot remarks that
on comparing the young dragon-trees which he
had seen at Orotava with the giant tree in M.
Franchi’s garden, the calculations he had made
upon the probable age of the latter have more
than once outstripped his most elevated imagi-
nations.

It may perhaps serve to shew in a more strik-
ing light the wonderful ages to which different
trees occasionally attain, if we place them in the
form of a table. Thus after careful examina-
tion it would appear, that the following trees
have attained the enormous ages appended to
each of them.

YEARS.

Cedar-trees . : ° A - 800
Oaks ‘ : 4 from 800 to 1600
Lime-trees . - - : . 1100
Plane-trees ;: : : : 2000
Yews . : from 1200 to 3000
Baobabs . - : : . 5000
Courbarils . : . from 2000 to 4000
Cypresses . - . . : 4000

What a subject for reflection is here! What
was the age of the oldest man that ever lived,
compared to that of these long-lived offspring of

THE BRABURN YEW-TREE, 199

the earth! Think of the old Yew-tree in Bra-
burn churchyard; what a life would the life of
that tree be could it be written! But rolling
years, although they each left the print of their
footsteps in the concentric ring-marks on the
inner stem, have left no other trace of their
events; and all that can be learned from the
contemplation of them is but the number of the
ages which have glided by, and left the Yew-tree
yet alive. Yet what cannot be learned directly
from the tree itself, we may be able to supply
from other sources of knowledge.

Eleven hundred and fifty years before the birth
of Our Lord, the Braburn Yew-tree was a sapling
just rising from the soil of savage England, The
sun that shone upon its young branches, shone
likewise, but with more fervent heat, upon the
head of the aged Eli and the child Samuel, min-
istering before the Lord in the tabernacle at
Shiloh. It lived and grew, and began to lift its
head and look out upon the land; but no village
clustering round the ivied church was there, no
fields golden with corn or green with grass, nor
any bared and naked by the plough; nothing but
a tangled wilderness where the wild hart had

200 LIFE OF A TREE.

its lair,—a wilderness the solitude of which was
broken by no voice of man, but which was the
undisturbed domain of birds and beasts and rep-
tiles, of which nothing but the dead bones now
are to be found. A century later saw, as it is
said, the vessels of a Trojan warrior touch the
desolate shores of England, and establish the first
colony in our island; it also saw the good King
David reigning over the many thousands of Israel
and Judah; and it saw the Yew-tree, then arrived
at tall and fair proportions, holding up a head
that was to brave the contests of a score of cen-
turies, boldly but modestly amongst the trees in
its vicinity. King David was gathered to his
fathers; the foreign colonists were succeeded
by their children of many generations down-
wards; but the Yew-tree grew stronger and
stronger amid the decay of every other earthly
thing.

The great stream of the river Time flowed on,
sweeping down year by year its millions of the
human race, while fresh millions followed in their
place. Rome, the “ mistress of the world,” as
she has been called, received her first stone, grew
great and powerful, and conquered distant na-

ITS HISTORY. 201

tions. The long line of Jewish kings disappeared
in all but the name. The voice of the Old
Testament prophets ceased, England grew popu-
lous and cultivated in parts, Julius Cesar invaded
our shores, and, after a stubborn resistance, put
Britain under the Roman yoke. And the Bra-
burn Yew-tree continued to grow stronger and
stronger amid the change of earthly things, and
of the destinies of its native land.

Eleven hundred and fifty years were written
in unerring characters upon the heart-wood of
the Braburn Yew. Yet it shewed no symptoms
of decay; nay, rather it seemed as if the past
time had only heaped upon it additional strength,
vigour, and size. Men had long regarded it
as an object of extreme antiquity, little dream-
ing that but a third of its life was yet spent, and
that its evergreen branches should wave over the
last resting-places of their children of the for-
tieth generation !

There was the silence and darkness of night
brooding over England. The stars glimmered
with their diamond-light in the deep, unfathom-
able, arched heavens. The wind was asleep, the
earth too slept, and in his rude uncomfortable

202 LIFE OF A TREE.

hut the half-savage Britain slept also. In the
forest, now and then a leaf left by Autumn on
the topmost bough, snapped off and tumbled to
the ground. And as the cold of night increased,
a long-rotten branch broke also, and fell rust-
ling down. Beside these, and the occasional
whoop of the night-owl, all was still; and the
great Yew-tree, with its countless leaflets, seemed
as though itself were listening. What a scene
was then taking place in the far distant East!
There were in that country shepherds abiding
in the field keeping watch over their flock by
night. ‘‘ And, lo, the angel of the Lord came
upon them, and the glory of the Lord shone
round about them.—And the angel said unto
them,—Unto you is born this day, in the city
of David a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord.—
And suddenly there was with the angel a
multitude of the heavenly host praising God,
and saying, Glory to God in the Highest, and
on earth peace, good will toward men.” Yes!
the Braburn Yew-tree lived at the moment
when the whispering of a “Saviour born” went

round the earth, and filled the heaven with
praise.

THE CUBBEER BURR. 203

It was alive, and may have felt the earthquake,
and beheld the darkened sun, when later on in
time the Saviour bled and died upon the accursed
tree. The far and wide proclamation of the
Gospel; the rise and fall of empires, states, and
kingdoms; the annihilation of nations, cities
and armies; the rolling away of the clouds
of ignorance, heathenism, and superstition; the
era of the dawn of light upon our country,
the memorable Reformation and its companion
blessings, with all the long roll of events un-
folded in the providence of God, down even to
our own age, when the snorting sound of the
locomotive and the rushing to and fro of the
chariots, sweep in sharp vibrations through the
aged boughs ;—all these, and more than we can
tell beside, had a place in the life-time of this
patriarch Yew-tree. Would that the Braburn
Yew-tree had a tongue, and that, resting under
its venerable branches, we could hear it unfold
in order the mighty and momentous things that
have taken place in the three thousand years of
its existence !

But it is time well returned to our more
immediate subject. The famous Banyan-tree

204: LIFE OF A TREE.

deserves mention on account of its great age.
A celebrated one is flourishing still in the
island of Nerbuddah, and is called by the
name of the Cubbeer Burr. It is supposed to
be about three thousand years old: it possesses
three hundred and fifty large trunks, and three
thousand smaller ones; each of its branches
is continually adding to this number by sending
down roots which subsequently take root in the
soil. The tree is in fact more like a forest than
a tree, and is the dwelling-place of thousands
of birds, insects and small animals. Its entire
circumference is about two thousand feet; but
from the fact just mentioned, namely, the con-
tinual putting forth of new trunks, we are
not justified in considering it as a single tree,
but rather as a union of many _ separate
ones.

Before quitting the subject of the age and
size of trees, a curious fact connected there-
with may be mentioned. ‘The Americans, who
are fond of anything striking and uncommon,
published an account in one of their papers,
some years since, of a singular exhibition then
being shewn at the American Museum at New

SHOP IN A SYCAMORE TRUNK. 205

‘~~

York, It appears that a Sycamore-tree of
enormous size had been cut down, and a large
portion was cut off the bottom of its trunk,
hollowed out artificially, and turned into a
drawing-room! We presume the trunk was
placed horizontally, and the room was thus
formed in the length of the trunk. It was
splendidly furnished inside, and was ornamented
with a profusion of articles of elegance and
utility. Magnificent mirrors adorned its sides,
and carpet, sofa, and chairs were arranged in
it for the accommodation of visitors, who, if
they were musical, might enjoy the additional
luxury of a fine piano! Beautiful pictures
were hung upon the wooden walls, and those
little knick-knacks which ladies delight to
scatter about their boudoirs, were appropriately
placed in this strange apartment. It was stated
that it would accommodate comfortably forty
or fifty persons. The same papers contained
an account of another Sycamore trunk, which
was fitted up and in constant use as a shop!
Both these must have been splendid trees, and
it almost seems a pity to have destroyed them
simply to turn them into great baby-houses,

206 LIFE OF A TREE.

It may be asked, ere we conclude our chapter,
whether the trees which attain to this extreme
old age are capable of still bringing forth
flowers and fruit? Unquestionably they are.
The return of the fruit-bearing season to the
rest of the vegetable world, is not less a return
of vigour to them also, although hundreds, or
even thousands, of the year-waves of time have
swept over them. The Apple-tree of fifty years
of age, if it has not exhausted the soil, bears
its fortieth load, and may think, so to speak,
proudly of itself; but the mighty Oak, whose
bold figure heads our chapter, bears its fruit-load
too,—and that, not for the fortieth, but five
hundredth time. The mere circumstance of
their great age does not necessarily preclude
the possibility of their ‘still bringing forth
fruit.” But if the soil in which these old trees
grow has been drained of those ingredients which
the tree requires for the production of fruit,
then of course the old age of the tree will be
barren and unproductive.

In proof of this, the following facts may be
brought forward. There are some Olive-trees
at Jerusalem, which still bear fruit, of whose

FRUIT IN OLD AGE. 207

real age we are able to ascertain, according to
M. de Chateaubriand, a very satisfactory proof.
When Palestine was overrun by the Turks, in
the year 1075, the Olive-trees then standing were
to pay a tax of a small portion of their produce
to the conquerors, while all that should be after-
wards planted were to forfeit half their fruit to
the Sultan. Now, the Olive-trees in question
only pay the small tax, and it is therefore highly
probable that they existed when the Turks
entered Palestine, and are therefore eight hundred
years old, or nearly that. Hence for eight hun-
dred years these trees have yielded fruit for the
service of man. Could each year’s produce be
ascertained, how many tons of Olives would the
entire sum for this period shew! Again, when
Baron Humboldt visited the giant Dragon-tree of
Orotava, he writes of it, “ It still bears every year
both fruit and leaves. Its aspect feelingly recals
to my mind that eternal youth of nature which is
an inexhaustible source of motion and of life.”
Yet this tree cannot be much under two thousand
years old, and is probably older considerably even
than that.

Another year has gone by and left its seal upon

208 LIFE OF A TREE.

the tree’s stem, and again the approach of Winter
warns the aged trunk to make ready for the airy
conflicts of the season. The leaves are dropped,
the young buds are wrapped up warm and close
in their varnished coatings, and the mighty king
of the forest stands stripped for the battle, await-
ing the first onset of the tempestuous time. It
can look back, perchance, on the victories of half
a millenium, and has, as we may think, but little
cause to dread the conflicts yet to come. How
long it may yet survive we darenotsay. The eye
that rests upon these pages may be dim with age,
and the hand that writes crumbled to dust; yet
the old tree may live and flourish, and year by
year renew its strength. It seems to set Time
and Mortality at defiance. Let us wait and
see.

WHIMPER

THE DEATH OF THE TREE.

THE DEATH OF THE TREE. Ag |

CHAPTER V.
THE DEATH OF THE TREE

THE aged tree is dead! Many Winters have
passed over it, many storms battled with it, the
lightning struck it, time, air, rain, insects, worms,
and the plants called parasites, preyed upon it ; it
could stand no longer. A howling north-wester had
been ploughing up the face of the country all the
day, carrying on its swift invisible wings broken
branches, withered leaves, portions of haystacks,
and the wreck of such like things. The tree
trembled and groaned in its strong embrace;
the sun went down, but the battle continued
half through the moonless night. Limb after
limb was snapped off with a crash like the
discharge of a fowling-piece. It was near mid-
night,—the storm rose higher and higher: look-
ing out, nothing was to be seen but the indistinct
forms of mighty trees doing obeisance to the

O12 LIFE OF A TREE.

over-conquering wind; looking to the tree, its
great form was as upright as ever, but through
the dim half-light, half-obscurity, could be seen
its thousand branches shaken with the mighty
wrestling, and every now and then a strong con-
vulsion seized its huge limbs. What a night
was that! How the air reeled and whirled in
its course, carrying all before it! What a fitful
roar every now and then shook hill and dale, as
it came in fiercer gusts sweeping over the fright-
ened country. Again and again the wind and
the tree joined issue, and though with occasional
damage, the tree came off victor. Midnight came,
a heap of dark and heavy clouds darkened the
air, and the storm was at its height. The roar
of the tempest was now awful beyond description.
A fiercer gust than any came up and laid its
violent grasp upon a tree; for a minute the
tree stood—in a minute more, a sound, like that
of distant thunder, swept across the fields :—the
great tree was blown down, all but the ruined
stump on yonder Frontispiece. Such was the
death of a tree with which the contending
elements for more than five hundred years had
warred in vain.

CAUSE OF DEATH. 213

The death of this tree, and of many others,
was brought about in the following manner.
Many years ago in somewhat such a night as
that of its death, the tree, then strong and solid,
lost a great limb by the violence of the storm.
Succeeding storms injured it in various ways,
and thus tore open its tissues, exposing the un-
protected stump to the destroying influence of
air and moisture. Now, such is the powerful
chemical influence of these two, apparently so
innocuous and feeble agents, that it becomes
impossible for wood to be long exposed to their
attacks without rotting. The oxygen gas that
forms part of the air, enters into union with the
fibres of the wood, together with the moisture
of the falling shower; and in process of time
they render it quite soft, brown in colour, and
very easily broken in texture. In the language
intelligible to chemists it is converted into Humus ;
that is into brown mould, much like that which
forms part of our gardens. ‘This may be easily
confirmed, if any of our readers will take the trou-
ble to compare what they will find in the hollow
trunk of some wayside tree with the mould of
a flower-bed; only it is always to be remembered

214 LIFE OF A TREE.

that the latter contains, besides decayed wood,
a large quantity of various earthy and mineral
substances,

Unfortunately for the tree, this decay does not
stop at the broken stump; it extends further and
deeper into the trunk. The more limbs have
been broken off, the more rapidly will the decay
go on. Gradually the centre of the trunk becomes
attacked, as being the oldest and least able to resist
the progress of the disease. It becomes more and
more eaten away; at first a wren built her nest
in it, but by and by the hollow grew too large
for her, and she shifted her quarters elsewhere.
School-boys then found it out, and amused them-
selves with casting heaps of stones into it. Later
on, the hollow became the favourite hiding-
place of children; and after this the shepherd
took his mid-day sleep therein. So it went on,
becoming yearly, but very slowly, more and more
capacious, and threatening the life of the tree
at every storm, in proportion as it weakened
and consumed away the strength and substance
of the wooden walls. The Frontispiece shews to
what an extent this hollow ultimately reached ;
for we read of the venerable tree whose portrait

CARRIAGE DRIVEN THROUGH A TREE. 215

is there represented, that ‘‘In the year 1724, a
road-way was cut through its trunk, higher than
the entrance to Westminster Abbey, and sufli-
ciently capacious to permit a carriage and four
horses to pass through it. A print of it was
published at that time, in which it scarcely varies
from its present appearance, excepting that the
artist has sought to heighten the effect by
choosing the moment when one of the old-
fashioned equipages of the day, and its four
long-tailed appendages, were passing through the
cavity.”* When this decay has gone thus far, the
powerful pressure of the wind is sure ultimately
to lay the crown of the tree level with the
earth, and very frequently to prostrate the entire
trunk.

What a mournful picture of decay and death
is presented to.us by the tree whose history we
have been seeking to unfold for these many
pages past. Where is its young luxuriance, its
mature vigour, its old age green and fresh, now ?
Spring may invite out, as before, leaves and blos-
soms, but they come no more obedient to its call

to adorn the naked trunk. The bright and play-

* Strutt. Sylva Britannica.

216 LIFE OF A TREE.

ful ray of the Summer’s sun may warm the old
timber, and dart here and there into its huge
recesses ; but there is now no sap to change, and
no fruit to ripen. Autumn comes and finds her
old companion for half a thousand years struck
dead at last, and no longer sensible to the sweet
influences of the season. Winter rejoices over
the hoary monarch, terrible, gaunt, and majestic
even in death; for Winter laid him low, and sends
his fierce messengers, the winds, to buffet and
molest the rugged remnant of the dead trunk,
and then, as though with a trace of pity, buries
the sad monument of its own ruthlessness in a
mountain of snow.

Is there an ‘‘ appointed time”’ for the duration
of vegetable life? Job tells us, Chap. xiv. 7.
‘“‘ There is hope of a tree, if it be cut down, that
it will sprout again, and that the tender branch
thereof will not cease. Though the root thereof
wax old in the earth, and the stock thereof die
in the ground; yet through the scent of water it
will bud, and bring forth boughs like a plant.
But man dieth, and wasteth away ; yea, man giveth
up the ghost, and where is he?” But this sen-
tence, in all probability, is only intended to apply

PERENNIALS. Q17

to those plants which die down to the ground
every year, and put up a newstem in the succeed-
ing Spring :—these plants are called Perennials.
But not so with the tree,—as it falls, so it must
lie. Once dead, no scent of water nor animating
influence of any kind from without will cause it
again to put forth the tender branch. It seems
probable that there is an “ appointed time” for
plants as well as for animals; a time, at the close
of which, even allowing that they had escaped
every accident and disease, they must pass from
the stage of native existence, and return to their
original dust. It must be added, however, that
all botanists do not think thus. The celebrated
De Candolle, whom we have so often quoted,
believes that plants do not die of old age, but in
all cases perish either by means of some fatal
accident or other hindrance to their growth. But
others, such as M. Mirbel, of equal authority and
talent, believe that independently of casualties or
disease, plants of all kinds are doomed to die of
old age.

Just as in the animal world there are insects
which are born and perish in a day, so in the vege-
table kingdom there are plants which are not

218 LIFE OF A TREE.

only born and dead in a day, but in the course
of a few hours. Several of the fungous plants,
such as the delicate “moulds” which so soon
appear on our food if it is allowed to become
bad, only exist as individual plants a few hours.
There is one of them in particular, called the
Achlya Prolifera, which completes its appointed
time in an hour or two. This little plant can
only be seen by means of the microscope, and has
been described as consisting of transparent threads
of extreme fineness, packed together as closely as
the pile of velvet; at the top of each little thread
is a minute ball of the shape of a pear, so minute
that twelve hundred would lie in the length
of this, line; : that .is;!an): inch: —————e—eEeee
These little balls are hollow, and contain a
number of very small granules, which are con-
stantly moving about, until at length the cell
or ball bursts and lets them out, when they
become plants themselves. Now, if we regarded
each of these little threads as a separate plant,
we should find, that in a period of not longer
than three or four hours, the little plant would
be born, become the parent of a multitude of
others, and perish. It is an interesting fact in

DISEASES OF PLANTS. 919

_ connexion with this plant, to know that it often
causes the death of gold-fish. Being capable
of growing under water, it attacks the poor
fish, spreads itself over its body, covering it
with a whitish slime, and sometimes in less
than the course of a day destroys the fish even
if it had been apparently quite healthy pre-
viously. Should the fish be seen thus covered,
the reader will know the nature of its disease,
by which it is, as it were, caught in a vegetable
net; but we are sorry to have to add that we are
not acquainted with any remedy that can be
successfully adopted to get rid of the disease.
The plants next in point of age to these are
perhaps those called Annuals. These are sown
in the Spring, presently spring up, grow luxu-
riantly for a few months, and as Winter comes,
wither and die. The great Sunflower, which
reaches such a height and vigour of growth,
and turns up its golden features to the sky for
many a long Summer day, perishes as the night-
frosts come on, its leaves and stems turn brown,
and the next breeze humbles it to the earth.
After these come the Biennials; in these the
flower-stem is not developed, nor the flower,

220) LIFE OF A TREE.

nor seed formed during the first year; but all
this takes place in the second year,—after which
the plant perishes. Then come Perennials, which
complete their round of developement in the year,
die down in Winter, and rise again with new glory
and vigour in the following Spring. “In most
woody plants,” says M. Mirbel, ‘‘ death does not
occur until fructification has recurred for a
greater or less number of years; some of the
monocotyledonous (Endogenous) plants however,
such as the Sago-tree and Umbrella-tree, with
immense fan-formed leaves of eight or ten yards
in length, only bear fruit once, and then die.”
*‘In proportion,” continues the same author,
‘‘as a tree increases in size, the vessels of its
woody layers become obstructed, and the sap
circulates with less freedom. Hence, absorption
and secretion decrease after youth, in proportion
as the bulk of the tree is enlarged; the bark
becomes less vigorous; the buds and roots be-
come fewer and feebler; the branches wither;
the stem decays at the head; water settles in the
injured parts ; and the wood moulders away.”
There are a number of causes which may
hasten the death of plants, irrespective of the

EXHAUSTION OF THE SOIL. 99]

effects of old age. As they are unable to leave
the position in which they are found in the soil,
their only means of obtaining fresh nourishment
being the elongation of their roots, it is very
evident when they have consumed all the food of
an appropriate kind that they can find, they must
become gradually more and more feeble, and
will at last die slowly of starvation. It is true,
the roots are ever on the search for fresh food;
but then there may be certain difficulties in the
soil itself which they cannot overcome. Let us
quote for example the instance given us by our
Saviour in the parable of the sower, the seed
sown on a rock, the plant quickly springs up;
but because there is not sufficient earth and
room for the roots, it soon withers away and
dies. So under the surface of the ground
there may be various obstacles which render
it impossible for the roots to proceed beyond a
certain distance; and the inevitable consequence
to the tree will be, first, that it becomes flower-
less and fruitless, and finally that it perishes
altogether.

In addition to these circumstances, a number
of causes acting as it is said purely from without,

a2 LIFE OF A TREE,

that is, not dependent on changes taking place
in the tissues of plants, hasten their decay and
premature close of life. Thus a plant may be
erowing where it cannot get enough air, or enough
light, or it may be consumed with thirst; or
there may be some substances actually deadly
to it in the soil; or other plants, such as weeds,
may crowd around it, and suffocate it by their
close-entangled roots. The wild beast may trample
it down, the tempest may uproot it, the severity
of the Winter may freeze it through, the heat
of Summer may scorch it, and finally, man him-
self, whether in the character of the woodman,
reaper, or gardener, may put an end to its exist-
ence for the accommodation of his own purposes,
or for the gratification of his tastes.

Beside all these messengers of death to the
vegetable kingdom, it is a very interesting and
singular fact that plants are subject, just as man
and animals, to the attacks of disease. To us
who have suffered so severely in consequence of
the recent visitation of Providence,—the potato
disease, —this subject is peculiarly interesting ;
but it is impossible to spare room to enter into
it fully in these pages. There is a disease liable

WANT OF LIGHT. 993

to attack the plants we keep in our drawing-
rooms, particularly if our houses are situated in
dark and smoke-obscured quarters of the city,
which is simply caused by the absence of suffi-
cient light; this is called etiolation. Every one
must have noticed the difference in the look of in-
door and out-of-door plants; it is as great (and
curious to say it depends upon the same cause)
as between a Londoner and a ruddy ploughman
fresh from the cart-tail. We may refer back the
reader to page 69, for the purpose of refreshing
his recollection on the influences of light. This
is the sole cause of this malady,—the plant has
not enough light; it consequently becomes of a
sickly, pale-yellow colour, grows weak and
straggling, and ultimately dies, pining away for
the absent sun-light.

We are perhaps right when we say, that the
art of gardening lies in a great measure in bring-
ing up plants in perfect health. Just as the
little squalid children of our streets are sickly
and pale, and prone to many diseases that never
attack children placed by the Providence of God
in happier circumstances; so plants that are neg-
lected by their owners, fed with improper food,

294. LIFE OF A TREE.

either too much or too little, or not of the right
kind, cannot but grow up feeble and sickly things,
scarcely able to bear the exhaustive effort of
flowering, and soon dying away, perhaps to the
great perplexity of the careless or ignorant pos-
sessor of them. It is quite certain that plants
may die of the dropsy if they are too much
watered. Succulent plants in particular will
sometimes suddenly become diseased in conse-
quence of the mistaken kindness of too much
and too frequent watering.

There is acurious disease of trees called Honey-
dew,* which is both a pretty and expressive name.
It consists in the leaves of the tree pouring out
clear thick, sweet drops of honey-like liquid.
For a long time it was thought to be the effect of
little insects piercing the leaves; but this expla-
nation is now generally considered incorrect. A
gentleman in Germany possessed a plant growing
in his house, which exuded on the surface of
its leaves in each September large colourless
drops, which formed regular crystals of sugar-
candy upon drying. It has also been observed,

* It is right to mention that the Honey-dew has been attributed to
other causes, such as the exudation from the bodies of insects.

THE POTATO-DISEASE. 295

during very hot and dry summers, that the leaves
of Lime-trees have become covered with a thick
and sweet liquid, and in such quantity that for
several hours of the day it ran off the trees like
drops of rain. Many pounds might in fact
have been collected from one tree; the juice con-
tained sugar. We can scarcely assert, however,
that these diseases are such as are calculated
to shorten the life of the plant, excepting so far
as they shew that it is an unhealthy condition.
The terrible Potato-Disease has been variously
accounted for, but still remains inexplicable.
Some singular circumstances have been mentioned,
as to its appearing in certain fields of particular
districts of the country, very shortly after the
appearance of thick, peculiar clouds of fog.
From which it has been supposed that the fog
must have contained some unusually destructive
ingredient. How far this conjecture is sufli-
cient to explain all the phenomena attendant
on this visitation, we are not here able to say.
Others believed that it was produced by the
attacks of insects; which certainly was quite in-
correct. Many chemists believed it to be owing
to bad agricultural management; and others at-
Q

296 LIFE OF A TREE.

tributed it to changes in the electricity of the air.
The poor called it the potato-cholera; perhaps —

ORCHIDS GROWING ON A DEAD TRUNK.

only because the progress of the disease in the
vegetable was almost as rapid as the disease of the
same name in the human subject.

PARASITE PLANTS. art

Plants are subject to the attacks of other
plants which grow upon and even within them.
Some of these actually live by drawing away the
sap of the plants or trees on which they luxuriate ;
but others, like the beautiful orchids represented
growing on the branches of that dead tree in
the cut, simply rest upon the tree and do not
derive anything from it, living upon the air, and
only putting forth a sufficiency of small roots on
the branch on which they repose, to secure them
to it, while they send out their large roots into
the air around. The mistletoe, on the other hand,
is a true parasite,—that is, really and truly lives
by sucking the juices of the tree on which it
grows.

These “parasites” are of a large size, and their
deleterious influence on vegetable life is exercised
only on one or two individuals in a hedge-row or
field. The most alarmingly destructive are of a
very minute size, and in fact only to be seen by
the help of the microscope; and these may some-
times cause terror to an entire nation by the
ravages they commit among plants upon which we
depend for our food. The blights of wheat are,

several of them, of a vegetable nature, consist-

2298 LIFE OF A TREE.

ing of very minute fungous plants. ‘The disease
called by the farmers the “ Rust” in wheat is of
this nature. It attacks the corn-fields in Spring,
particularly in wet seasons ; and soon causes the
heart of the agriculturist to tremble for his crops,
as with sorrow he contemplates their drooping,
yellow, sickly aspect. While the wet weather
lasts, the fungus grows rapidly, the corn-plant
suffering in proportion; but if the rain is stayed,
if the sun again sheds his warm influence on the
fields, and the moisture thus becomes dispersed,
the fungus soon withers away, and the drooping
blades stand fresh, green, and erect, as though
they had never been the victims of disease. An-
other is called the wheat-mildew, and is also
most liable to attack the corn in moist seasons.
The little seeds, or more properly speaking
‘“‘sporules,” from which these fungi are deve-
loped, are infinite In number, and of extreme
minuteness in size. ‘They are supposed to rise
like thin smoke into the air by evaporation, and
are then scattered about in every direction by
the winds. An author who has paid much at-
tention to these matters, has calculated that in
one plant there were at least ten millions of these

INSECT ENEMIES. 299

fungi. This disease is at times very destruc-
tive.

A host of insects also attack plants and produce
disease more or less injurious to them. Every
one who has had a rose-tree under his care, must
have noticed occasionally a general unhealthiness
of appearance steal over the plant, many of the
leaves drooping, and the branches ceasing to
grow. On turning up the leaves, there will gene-
rally be found a thick crowd of green insects
which are feeding with all their might upon the
pleasant sap of the young shoots. These are
called Aphides, and if not checked they will
ultimately destroy the plant. The number of
the different species attacking vegetables is alto-
gether astonishing; and we are filled with wonder
to find, that we really suffer from their attacks
in our gardens, fields, and orchards, as little as
we do, when we remember how easily their num-
bers might be multiplied, and how awful have
their devastations been on _ special occasions.
More than once have the desolations produced by
a caterpillar humbled great nations, and brought
crowds into the house of God to entreat Him
to remove the plague from the land, and this

230 LIFE OF A TREE.

even in England and France. In the East it
is of course well known to the reader that the
plague of locusts both has been and is the most
terrible of the visitations of Divine Providence,
in consequence of their eating up every green
thing, and leaving the country behind them
with the appearance as if a consuming fire had
scorched up every plant, shrub, and tree. By
their attacks on Oak-trees, insects produce the
little excrescences so useful and well known as
oak-galls. This disease, however, is not fatal
to the trees.

These few remarks upon the diseases of the
vegetable world, though mere outlines of this
interesting subject, will help to shew that plants
are not less liable to the evidences of mortality
than men and animals. However fair they may
bid to endure, not for an age but for ever,
disease marks them as well as us for its own,
and in some one out of a thousand ways death
comes at last, even to trees which have braved
out every opposition for more than a _ thou-
sand -years.

After death many important changes take place,
to which it is necessary to allude before con-

DRY ROT. 231

cluding the history of the Tree. When an animal
dies, a process of putrefaction begins, which ter-
minates in reducing the entire frame to water,
earth, and gas. ‘“‘ Dust thou art,” said the voice
of the Lord God in the garden of Eden, “and
unto dust shalt thou return.” Such likewise is
the fate of every created thing in the vegetable
world, from the grass that is cut down and
withereth, to the tallest and greatest tree of the
forest. To dust must all return. It is true that
man cuts down wood, and prepares it for his own
purposes, and by incorporating it into buildings,
helps to preserve it from destruction for a certain
time. This only defers the time of its being re-
duced to dust, and unless the wood is chemically
prepared, dust it will still certainly in the end be-
come, By steeping the timber in some chemical
solutions, such as solution of corrosive sublimate,
which is the plan adopted by Mr. Kyan, in his
celebrated method of preserving wood from
decay, it is possible to keep it for a very long
time without its rotting; how long, time must
prove.

The disease called Dry Rot is that which is

most prone to attack the timber of our dwellings.

932 LIFE OF A TREE,

The wood becomes brittle, and crumbles into a
yellow powder. In damp situations, this change
takes place very rapidly, producing in the course
of a few years the most alarming injury to entire
buildings and ships. It is not clear what the
exact chemical nature of this change is. It seems
to be connected with the influence of little fun-
gous plants which infest timber; but it certainly
often takes place without fungi being present.
Another form in which the decay of woody fibre
takes place is very important for us to consider ;
it takes place under water.

Has the reader never plunged his hand beneath
the waters of the brook in search of ‘ bait,” and
drawn forth a mass of rotting sticks and chips,
already turning soft and brown under the in-
fluence of this form of decay? If he has, he may
be informed that he has seen the first step in the
process of the formation of Coal! Were we to
be asked What is coal? it would probably be
the best answer to describe it as wood which
has rotted under water and has afterwards been
subjected to great pressure from heaps of mud
overlying it, and which has in consequence of
these two things, rotting and pressure, become

ee

Qo

FORMATION OF COAL. 933

consolidated into the black and stony substance
—coal. ‘There can scarcely be any question that
all the great beds of coal forming the various coal-
fields, as they are called in our own and other
lands, were once living forms of vegetation. The
remains of leaves, seeds, roots, and stems have
been found in coal, thus appearing to shew with-
out a doubt that this substance was once in the
very different shape of perhaps stately trees,
elegant shrubs, or even fruit and flowers. What
an astonishing change of circumstances, to think
that the matter which long ago basked in sun-
light, and possibly filled the air with fragrant
odours, is now deep buried under the surface of
the earth, whence it must be dug in darkness and
danger; and owing in a great measure to our
ignorance about the philosophy of the fire-grate,
instead of diffusing perfume, emits the most dis-
agreeable odours, polluting the atmosphere it
once helped to purify! Most enormous is the
mass of wood thus rotted and turned into coal, as
may be imagined from the following facts. The
annual consumption of coal in Europe amounts
to more than 33,875,000 tons; and careful calcu-
lations shew that even if the consumption of coal

254 LIFE OF A TREE.

should increase, the store laid up by Divine Pro-
vidence for the use of man will certainly last for
five hundred years longer! Such a store corre-
sponds to about 12,025,000,000 tons of carbon.*
Amazing thought—all this derived from the air!
The nature of the chemical changes by which
wood becomes coal would be far too intricate for
us to study in this little work. We must there-
fore remain for the present satisfied with the
bare statement of this apparently unquestionable
truth, that under appropriate circumstances a se-
ries of decompositions take place in woody fibre,
which end in the production of coal.

The remaining process of decay is the most
common of all. By means of it, all existing
forms of vegetation, when they die, are reduced
to dust, or more properly, to mould. All parts
of a tree become by this process equally resolved
into the same substance. It only wants time
for the solid stem to take the same condi-
tion and character, in every respect, as the deli-
cately tissued leaf, or the tender blade of grass.
The chemical forces attack each alike, the
only difference being, that the soft and juicy

* Dr. Schleiden.

CHEMICAL DECAY. 935

nature of the one part more easily and quickly
yields to them, than the firmer and drier
nature of the woody tissues permits the other
to do.

This change has been already described in a
previous page, in alluding to the cause of the
decay in the trunk of the tree. It is, as has
been before said, the wind and the rain which
produce the crumbling down of the firmest strue-
tures of the vegetable world. These simple and,
in our eyes, weak and inefficient agencies, are
the Divinely appointed means whereby the dead
portions of plants, or the dead trunks of entire
trees, are, without fail, to be restored in a com-
mon but altered form to the bosom of the earth ;
nor can any vegetable structures long resist their
operations. By their means the materials long
since taken from the soil, in the shape of alkalis,
salts, and mineral ingredients, are all safely restored
again. During the period of its existence the
plant may indeed accumulate within itself a very
large portion of these substances, and in pro-
portion impoverish the soil in which it grows.
If these substances were to be no more restored
to the soil again, it would by and by become

236 LIFE OF A TREE,

totally unfit for cultivation, or at least for the
cultivation of the same plant. Man, for instance,
when he reaps the corn-field, carries away a large
portion of saline and other fertilizing substances
in the wheat, which he stores in his garner. But
he does not next year sow the same crop in the
same field, because he knows he has in a measure
exhausted it, and must wait until, by the chemical
influence of the air upon the soil, fresh saline and
mineral substances are set free. Now in order to
give back a portion of such matters again to the
field, what does man do? Precisely what Nature
does, as will be easily perceived from the fol-
lowing consideration. The straw of the wheat is
exposed to moisture and air in the stable; it be-
gins to rot, is then thrown on the dunghill, and
is in course of time, when quite rotted and brown
—now being termed manure—again spread over
the fields. Thus the various substances it con-
tained are in due time restored to the soil again,
with which they become mingled by means of
ploughing or harrowing. Such, too, is Nature’s
plan. In Autumn, the now useless leaves are
strewed on the earth, and in Winter a large
number of plants die. So soon as this takes

——

EFFECTS OF DECAY. 937

place, the same process of rotting goes forward;
and so, in the course of the next year, all the
saline and mineral substances of these leaves and
plants become mingled with, and restored to,
the soil.

The process of rotting, then, in the dead parts
of plants is one of great importance. It may
indeed be far from agreeable to our feelings to
watch the golden straw become converted into
the filthy manure, and we may perhaps feel
much annoyed at the damage done by this pro-
cess to the timbers we had stored up for our
own use. But in the changes here proceeding,
we ought to mark, with feelings of wonder and
of love, the working out of a great and beau-
tiful design in creation; one, in fact, without
the operation of which we should become sub-
ject to far greater inconveniences than those
just alluded to; or indeed, to any others
that might arise out of this principle of de-
cay. The great dramatic poet wrote that we
might

“ Find tongues in trees, books in the running brooks,
Sermons in stones, and good in every thing.”

238 LIFE OF A TREE.

And is it not so when we can point to the steam-
ing dung-heap in proof of the wisdom and fore-
sight of the Great Creator and Lawgiver of the
Universe ?

In old trees that are undergoing this last of
changes, a great many agents help forward the
process. Among these we must specially par-
ticularize the fungus or mushroom tribe of plants
and the wood-boring insects. The latter are
generally its first visitors; some of them attach
themselves to the heart-wood, others to the
bark, and in a short time these innumerable
little carpenters will be found to have filled the
trunk with their tiny mines, covered ways, and
winding corridors; the wood then becomes satu-
rated with moisture, and the process of decay
advances rapidly. Now come the various spe-
cies of mushrooms or fungi, and establish them-
selves on the decaying mass, presenting us with
a strange and painful spectacle. By and by
these too pass away, and perish, and then the
venerable trunk has become one with the
soil.

Long, therefore, though the majestic mass

THE DEATH OF THE TREE. 239

of aged wood shewn in our Frontispiece may
stand, there are secret, and silent, but powerful
influences at work, which will eventually sweep
it from the scene it now solemnizes and adorns.
In the beautiful scheme of the creation, as laid
down and carried out by the all-wise and power-
ful God, who has so clearly and graciously re-
vealed Himself to us in His well-beloved Son,
our Lord Jesus Christ, and in His holy word
which He has given us, every created thing,
after living out its time, dies, and after death
the materials of which it was formed are re-
turned either to the air as gas, or to the earth
as water and dust. But with this difference: no
resurrection morning will call together the lost
particles of plants and animals,—but of man, the
possessor of a never dying soul, it is written,
while his flesh returns to dust, “his spirit shall
return to God who gave it,” and that his body
shall be raised again, never more to return to
the grave.

The hour, therefore, will certainly arrive when
The Tree will be no longer seen, when the
last work of decay and death will be done, and

240 LIFE OF A TREE.

when the green grass will wave over the place
where for many a rolling century it stood and

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MONTHLY FLOWER GARDEN, The. Edited by
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MONTHLY GLEANINGS from the FIELD and
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MONTHLY WILD FLOWERS, Edited by Ditto

MONTHLY WINDOW FLOWERS. Edited by
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MenaNn, The. By P. H..Gossz,F.RSi2 .. 6 as

OUR NATIVE SONGSTERS. By ANNE Pratt.
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PARIS, RAMBLES ROUND. By hey. C. i pRES

PENNY WISE and POUND FOOLISH. By Mrs.
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PEOPLE of EUROPE. ee a ‘Sind ‘Sosiee in
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PICTURE BOOKS for CHILDREN—ANIMALS.
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PICTURES and STORIES for LITTLE CHIL-
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PITCAIRN: the Island, the People, and the Partin
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READINGS from ENGLISH HISTORY, for CHIL-
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SALLY RAINBOW’S STORIES. oo Sequel to
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SCENES and NARRATIVES from the EARLY HIS-
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SCRIPTURE NATURAL HISTORY. .

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SELBORNE, NATURAL HISTORY ‘of By the late
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SHIPWRECKS and ADVENTURES at SEA . .
SHORT STORIES founded on EUROPEAN HIS-
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STORIES from ROMAN HISTORY. o!.“entligts Gales
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TEACHERS and TAUGHT. . .'. +.
TEMPEST, The. By CHARLES Tomemiean Exq.
New Edition Sete : : sits
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TWO. RERESIDES, The & Male. sisey., ie ce
VILLA of CLAUDIUS. A Tale of the Roman-British
Churehish i veke ds
WILD ANIMALS. First me Seat Series i ina Vol.

24 Celered Plates .. . 3... Mp eiaet? see mere
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