The wonders of vegetation

THE LIBRARY

OF

THE UNIVERSITY
OF CALIFORNIA

PRESENTED BY

PROF. CHARLES A. KOFOID AND
MRS. PRUDENCE W. KOFOID

THE

WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

FROM THE FRENCH OF

MARION.

EDITED, WITH NUMEROUS ADDITIONS,

BY SCHELE DE VEKE, D.D., LL.D.,

Of the University of Virginia.
AUTHOR OF "STUDIES IN ENGLISH," "AMERICANISMS," ETC.

WITH 61 ILLUSTRATIONS.

NEW YORK:

CHAKLES SCKIBNEK & CO.,

1872.

Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1871, by

CHARLES SCRIBNER & CO.,
In the Office of the Librarian of Congress at Washington.

STEREOTYPED BY R I V E R S . D E , C A M I, R I I»G *:

WILLIAM McCREA & CO..

NEWBURGU N Y PRINTED BY (I 0. IIOUfiUTON AMI COMPACT.

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.

PAGE.

Victoria Regina Frontispiece.

The Sacred Tree of the Isle de Fer 14

The Pine of the Mountains 15

Forest of Mangroves 22

Vegetation in the Tropics . 28

South American Scene 27

Forest in Brazil 33

Bread-Tree of Tahiti 36

Bread-Fruit 39

Cow-Tree 46

Milk-Tree of Guiana 49

Manna-Tree. 57

Travellers-Tree . 61

Spathe of Palm-Tree 65

The Palm 67

Bourbon Palm 81

Palms of the Seychelles 85

Arborescent Ferns 89

The Bamboo 92

The Baobab 103

The Cedars of the Atlas Mountains 108

The Giant Taper ... 113

The Screw Pine 115

Asclepias Gigantea . . . . . . .119

The Weeping-Tree 124

A Savage shooting poisoned Arrows 125

Gutta-Percha-Tree 127

Caoutchouc-Tree. . . 131

4 LIST OF ILLUSTRATION*

PAGE.

The deadly Upas . .• . 141

Upas-Tree 143

Valley of death— Java 149

The Oaks 151

The Oak of Allouville . .157

The Oak of Montra-vail 163

The Chestnut of Mount Etna 165

The Plane-Tree of Smyrna. . 169

The Sycamore of Trons . . . . . .175

The Dragou-Tree .183

Pitcher-Plant 189

Eagle Wing 191

Giant-Trees of California 193

Fallen Monarch 195

The Father of the Forest 197

Pioneer Cabin 199

The Mandrake 200

The " Devil's Apple " .203

Nympheacae 208

Orchids 215

The Yuccas 221

" 223

Rafflesia Arnoldi ...... . 227

Floating Leaves of Victoria Regina 229

Nepenthe. 236

Ice-Plant 240

Pyralis of the Vine . 241

Nutmeg-Tree 249

Antirrhinum Graecum . 251

The Bindweed 263

Papyrus 270

The Flora of the Sea 271

Forest of the Carboniferous Period . 278

INTltODUCTOKY NOTE.

zealous student who wishes to fathom all the
mysteries of Botany must needs have scientific
hand-books, drawn up with a careful regard to perfect
accuracy, and containing in systematic order the out-
lines of his science. The general reader, and especially
youths, on the other hand, require to be enticed by
more attractive and popular works. The following
pages are intended to be such an introduction to the
Science of Botany. The author has selected some of
the most wonderful plants of the vegetable kingdom,
and the most remarkable phenomena connected with
them, which cannot fail to interest. In issuing the
work in English, care has been taken to secure scien-
tific accuracy, and to bring the work up to a recent date.

THE AYONDEBS OF VEGETATION.

INTRODUCTION.

aim of this little work is to illustrate by charac-
teristic and striking examples one of the aspects
of the marvellous power of Nature. For Nature is
neither as familiar nor as dear to us as she ought to
be; and, as the tastes of society are daily becoming
more artificial, we are likely to remove farther and
farther from our great mother. It seems in fact as if
that science which seeks to discover her secrets knows
nowadays no higher aim than to apply these to the in-
dustries of man and perhaps to gratify curiosity. And
yet it is only by intimate intercourse with nature that
we can hope to extend our knowledge and to devel-
ope the affections of our heart. The more we aliena4 e
ourselves from her, the more we isolate ourselves and
the lower we sink in intellectual greatness ; while the
closer we draw to her, the higher we rise in knowl-
edge and in moral worth.

The magnificence and the glory of Nature may be
studied in all her works and are manifested in even
the smallest and apparently the most insignificant of
all her productions. Without doubt the imposing

8 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

spectacle of the heavenly bodies moving in their or-
bits, and the wonderful forces brought into play to
control their motions, astonish us by their vastness
and their power * but the surprise awakened in us at
the view of the celestial wonders has its source chief-
ly in the comparative material greatness of the ob-
jects we contemplate. The Author of Nature mani-
fests His greatness as much in the germination of a
plant or in the generation of a living being as in the
guidance of a sun across the starry fields. It is His
Almighty Hand that studs the heavens with millions
of stars ; but it is the same hand that daily scatters the
wind-blown seeds of earthly flowers upon the soft soil.
Both works reveal the action of an infinite intelli-
gence. To rescue a world beaming with life from the
fiery fury of a comet, or to close a corolla at the ap-
proach of cold fogs or the touch of the north wind ;
to spread out in space a milky-way rich in suns or to
adorn our garden trees with purple blossoms ; to di-
rect the gradual formation of the successive layers of
the earth's crust or to ripen the fruits that refresh us
in summer — these are equally the works of a Divine
Hand, a hand that recognizes no difference between
the small and the great.

To contemplate nature in flowers or in stars is
only to reach Truth in various ways : in both cases we
try to fathom the mysteries of the infinite in its dif-
ferent manifestations, to study the world under a
thousand aspects, to study Nature under two distinct
masters, but in the same school.

A full and complete description of the marvels of

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 9

vegetation would be a gigantic task ; for as we have
said, all the works of the Infinite are equally wonderful ;
all is marvellous in nature and the wonders of vegeta-
tion are limited only by the vegetable world itself. The
most modest of plants in our fields, peeping modestly
through the thick grass and those which reveal them-
selves under the microscope only, are quite as marvel-
lous as the splendid orchid, the hoary cedar, the trem-
bling sensitive plant and the poison tree. But in veg-
etation as in all things, the objects that appear to us
really marvellous are those which awaken within us
the most lively impressions. Owing to the natural in-
activity of our mind custom has the effect of blunting
our sensibilities, and of rendering our impressions less
lively by familiarity ; and thus the wonders which at
first secure our keenest attention and awaken our
most lively surprise, come in the course of time to be
regarded with indifference. " Custom stales their in-
. finite enchantment." What is unknown, — what is new
— will always seem striking to us and secure our atten-
tion. In proportion as the objects become familiar
they lose the power of exciting our wonder. Yet,
strictly speaking, two objects of equal interest can
never alter their relative position however accessible
either may become on investigation.

Suppose one of us, living in a distant world,
should reach the earth to-day for the first time — what
would be his surprise at beholding around him all the
manifold scenes, which, taken together, make up the
great work of nature ! The year is just beginning, and,
as at the dawn of day, joyous Spring reawakens the

10 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

sleeping forces and once more decks with beauty the
world that has been stripped by the rough hand of
Winter. The heavens seem to have undergone a new
birth — their fresh blue kisses the distant horizon ; the
soft breeze plays with the swelling buds ; the sun pours
down from on high his vivifying rays, verdure springs
ap anew, flowers and trees feel their life's blood once
more coursing through all their veins, and from the
highest mountains where vegetation still lingers, to
the green plains below, the whole earth seems to cel-
ebrate the return of Spring in joy and brightness.
What a marvellous transformation has been effected !

The trees of our orchards, the vast forests, which for
months have presented only bare trunks, and seemed
immovable, inert objects, which death had claimed
for its own, become green again, clothe themselves
once more with fresh leaves and spread their shade
over the peaceful retreats of the country. The habit
of seeing each year repeating the same marvel — the
same resurrection from death to life, keeps us from ap-
preciating it in all its grandeur, and recognizing in it
the prodigious forces at work. But if we think for an
instant of the aspect of winter and of that of the season
which succeeds it, we will be ourselves surprised at
the indifference with which we often regard* these
changes, without even a passing glance or an earnest
thought.

How much more, if to the general contemplation of
the great transformations of spring and summer we
should adki the special observations of each class of
plants. Then, if we attempted to follow the devel-

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. H

opment of each one of the various plants that grows
on the face of the globe, the wonder would be propor-
tionately greater. No two different species present
the same phenomena, and from the time of the ap-
pearance of their first leaves, to the ripening of their
fruits, they offer each a different spectacle.

Some plants guard their flowers from every glance,
and seem averse even to showing their stems and
leaves ; others again, appear to have been . created
only for show, and display to the dazzled glance their
wealth of sparkling and magnificent colors ; still oth-
ers seem to be of a more serious character, and, dis-
daining the frivolity of their gay companions, do not
reveal their existence till the time when their ripened
fruits attest their usefulness. Here the eye looks
amazed at the undiminished vigor of an aged oak,
which has seen in the time of our ancestors, proces-
sions of Druids pass through the gloomy forests, and
which is so old that it forgets the number of its years,
during which winds and tempests have in vain tried
to uproot the colossal structure. There we behold
a plant so fragile that it can hardly bear being touched,
and resents the fluttering of a bright-colored bird by
a painful shrinking of all its leaflets. But we have
not yet spoken of the marvellous wealth of colors.
"What pencil can reproduce those various tints that
adorn our beautiful flowers? In the meadows we
trample under foot whole hosts of tiny blossoms which
hide in the grass ; purple petals overhang the banks
of the stream whose murmur attracts us; at the roots
of great protecting trees wild violets exhale their

12 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

sweet perfumes, but all the beauties of tlie world of
plants remain unappreciated by many. They pass
by the dazzling white of the superb lily and bestow
not a glance; lovely rosebuds open to send forth
their splendor, unnoticed by the eye of man, and yet
can even the most perfect works of man's hand compare
in beauty with the most modest of the floral works
of nature ?

Nor are the splendid colors and the harmonious
tints of flowers their only charms ; even these beauties
are often surpassed by the rich perfumes of which
they preserve a rich treasury in their bosoms. Does
it not seem then that flowers are the most opulent of
created things, that Nature has lavished upon them
her choicest gifts and that she loves them best of all
her children ? Well may we ask, as we inhale the
evening breeze, laden with rich perfumes, what strange
gifts they bring us from flower and forest and what
magic effect these grateful odors have on our mind,
on our soul ? They seem to be almost spiritual in
their ethereal lightness and to possess powers bestowed
upon them from on high. They cannot be weighed
or measured, and we have as yet not succeeded in
fathoming their marvellous secret.

It is true then that all is marvellous in the vege-
table world, and that in describing their marvels we
should be bound to describe every thing. But since
it is equally true, as we have said above, that objects
which are continually before our eyes cease to interest
us, and since the new and the unknown alone appear
to us marvellous, we must needs seek among these

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 13

latter our illustrations of the wonders of vegetation.
We shall, therefore, go beyond the narrow circle of
our daily observation, and the facts which we are about
to present will at least possess the charm of novelty
as far as our daily thoughts are concerned ; and if we
can derive no interest from the things which surround
us, we will go further afield. Travelling is a good
master, let us follow him.

The Pine of the Mountains.

PART FIRST.

CHAPTEK I.

GENERAL VIEW OF THE GEOGRAPHICAL DISTRIBUTION OF
PLANTS ON THE SURFACE OF THE GLOBE.

carpet of plants which covers the earth does
not present throughout its whole extent a unity
of character independent of locality ; on the contrary,
each climate has its own physiognomy, and certain
species seem to have a preference for certain countries.
Some delight in the burning soil of the tropics or de-
velope their profuse wealth of fruit and flowers in the
warm and damp forests of the equator ; others shun
the heat of the sun and prefer temperate zones or
even the lands of the North. It is this fact that

16 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

gives to each country its peculiar aspect. The animal
world is too small in number, too restless and ever-
changing to impress its mark on a country. Hence of
the three kingdoms of nature the vegetable kingdom
is that which has the greatest power in impressing on
our mind an image of a land we have seen, and of the
great natural divisions of the earth. For rocks and
mountains also preserve the same forms everywhere
from the equator to the poles, and their aspects could
not give a special physiognomy to any country. But
the trees and the flowers, the aspect of fields and
meadows, of hills and plains, the forms and the colors
of the leaves and the size of the plants — these give a
character to the scene, on which we pass our lives and
with which we feel bound up as if it were a part of
our existence. And in long journeys amid the rich
and abundant productions of the tropics, the traveller
looks sadly and with regret for the trees of his native
land ; and his heart beats quicker as he sees at his feet
a plant or a flower of his father-land recalling to him
sweet memories of home.

The chief cause which rules in botanical geography
and governs the distribution of plants throughout the
countries of the globe, is temperature. Thus here also,
as in the whole harmonious life on earth, the sun
reigns as a sovereign — it is he who directs the or-
chestra, calling forth now soft and solemn cadences,
now light and brilliant melodies. Two hundred
thousand varieties of plants divide the surface of
the earth among themselves. One great law directs
the division, the law of temperature. No other force

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 17

exercises any thing like the degree of influence which
this agency brings to bear upon the distribution of
plants.

Let us for an instant consider the world as a sphere
turning upon its axis — an ideal line passing through
its centre — and call the two points where this line
would reach the surface as respectively the North and
South poles. The motion at the poles will of course
be inappreciable. We will give the name of the equa-
tor to the great ideal circle which passes round the
middle of the earth, dividing it into two equal halves
— the North and South hemispheres. Now, as the
rays of the sun are so much the more oblique the more
they diverge from the equator, it follows that the heat
at the equator is at the maximum while at the poles it
is at the minimum. With the decrease of heat from
the equator toward the poles corresponds the geograph-
ical distribution of plants. At the equator and in the
neighboring tropical regions we meet with the vast
proportions of the largest plants — as the boababs, the
palms, the elegant tree-ferns, the aloes, the heaths-
magnificent plants which love and seek heat. In leav-
ing these heated countries we encounter olives, laurels,
mimosas and bamboos. Continuing our route towards
the poles we see magnolias, chestnut-trees, cotton plants
and witchelms. Proceeding still further from the
tropics till we reach the latitude of France and Mid-
dle Europe, or our Middle and Eastern States, we
meet with oaks, beeches, willows and elms, with our
common fruit-trees and our cereals. In the Nor-
thern countries, near the limits of vegetation, we
2

18 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

still find the mountain ash, the pine-tree and all the
conifers.

At last even these plants cease to grow — the oak,
the hazel and the poplar at 60° North latitude ; the
birch and lime at 63° ; and the conifers are not found
higher than 67°. Beyond 70° only a few stunted wil-
lows grow here and there close to the ground. Fur-
ther north, beyond 75°, not a tree is to be found,
shrubs and plants even have disappeared and cereals
can no longer exist, for even barley and oats are not
found beyond 70°.

The local physiognomy of plants depends thus
upon the normal temperature of each climate. The
same principle is applied to the elevation at which
plants grow, and by combining the two, we are enabled
to understand in its entirety the distribution of plants
over our globe.

Instead of travelling from the equator towards
the poles, let us simply ascend a high mountain and
we will find that the classes of plants appear in the
same order, following the thermometric ladder of al-
titudes. We know that the higher we rise in the at-
mosphere, the lower we find the temperature ; and this
fall is so rapid that the ascent of a few minutes in a
balloon, or of a few hours upon a mountain side, takes
us through all the different degrees of temperature
from 70° or 80° of heat on the plains to the freezing-
point, and below in the higher regions of the atmos-
phere. In consequence of this law all the mountains
of the globe have a lower temperature at their sum-
mit than at their base ; and we find among their vege-

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 19

table productions the same characteristic zones of
vegetation which we meet with in going from the
equator toward the North or South pole. We might
therefore compare the two terrestrial hemispheres to
two mountains, supported the one against the other
~by their bases at the circle of the equator, their sum-
mits covered with eternal snows, and certain classes
of plants dwelling on their sides in regular succession
as we move from their tropical base to their polar
summit.

We can obtain an idea of the succession of plants
by following an ascent made by Mr. Ch. Martins,
of Montpellier, who divides with Humboldt, Hook-
er and a few renowned botanists the glory of ad-
vancing the geography of plants — a science which
had its birth at the commencement of the present
century. The following are the observations made
by him during the ascent of Mount Yentoux in
Provence:

" All the trees belonging to the lowest plains," he
says, " were found at the base of the mountain, the
characteristic trees being the Aleppo pine and the
olive-tree. The first does not appear at a greater ele-
vation than 1,300 feet above the level of the sea, the
second ascends farther, to about 1,500 feet. Besides
these trees we saw all the Southern species which
characterize the vegetation of Provence, the kermes
oak, the rosemary, and the Spanish broom. A nar-
row zone succeeded next, the chief feature of which
was the evergreen oak, which is not found beyond 1700
feet.

20 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

" A treeless region comes immediately after the
first two. The soil is bare, stony, and generally un-
cultivated. Yet here and there we saw some fields
of chick peas, of oats or of rye — the last being found
at 3,100 feet above the level of the Mediterranean ;
only one shrub, the box, thyme and lavender, and a
few other plants, shared with each other these desert-
ed regions. Beeches were seen at 4,000 feet. At
this height there is very little shelter to be found, and
the trees, exposed to the strong action of the wind
which bends them down to the ground, are really no
larger than bushes.

" At the height of 5,100 feet the cold is too keen,
the summer too short, and the wind too violent to al-
low even the beech any longer to thrive. On the
Ventoux, as well as on the Alps and the Pyrenees, a
coniferous tree is the last representative of arbores-
cent plants. It is a very humble kind of pine, called
the 'mountain pine.' These pines rise to the height
of some 10 or 15 feet in a few sheltered places, but be-
come thick shrubs where they are exposed to the
wind. They are found at an elevation of 5,430
feet, and mark the extreme limit of arborescent vege-
tation.

" Thus the plants teach us, as well as the best ba-
rometer, that we have reached the region where trees
disappear, but where the botanist will find, with de-
light, the plants of Lapland, of Iceland and of Spitz-
bergen. In the Alps, this region extends to the lim-
its of perpetual snow, the home of eternal winter ;
but as the Ventoux rises only to the height of 5,800

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 21

feet, its summit corresponds only to the lower part
of the Alpine region, in the Alps and Pyrenees.
At this height trees have entirely disappeared ; but
a number of small plants unfold their petals on the
surface of the stones or rocks. These are the or-
ange-flowered poppy, the violet of Mount Cenis, the
blue-flowering astragal, and at the very summit the
rneadow-grass of the Alps, Gerard Euphorbia, and the
common nettle, which appears wherever man builds
a house.

" On the northern slope we find the saxifrage,
which inhabits the Alpine summits amid perpetual
snows, and covers the icy shores of Spitzbergen."

Thus, whether we travel from the hot countries of
the equator to the icy regions of the pole, or rise
from temperate plains to snowy mountain summits,
we find that the heat-giving power of the sun alone
governs the distribution of plants. Each plant seeks
its own degree of heat. The dwarf birch resists a cold
of 400 below zero, the orchids are frozen at 50°
above it. On the other hand, each species requires a
certain amount of heat for germination ; and after
that, additional heat is necessary to enable it to flow-
er and ripen its seed. Our precious cereal, wheat,
refuses to ripen its golden ears, rich with bread that
makes the strength of man, unless it has 3600° of heat
in all, for the time from its first springing up till har-
vest ; and the darkling cluster of grapes cannot glad-
den the heart of man with its red wine, unless it have
5400°. This is why each plant shows a decided pref-
erence for a particular locality and a particular temper-

22 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

ature, why crops vary in different years according to
the amount of heat, and why each region of the globe
presents a peculiar physiognomy in its plants which
corresponds with the average degree of heat that there
prevails.

FOREST OP MANGROVES.

Vegetation in the Tropics.

CHAPTEK II.

VEGETATION IN THE TROPICS.

TN order to obtain some approximate idea of the
-•- grandeur and the magnificence of the vegetable
world, we must leave the temperate climates to which
we may have been accustomed, and pass from under
the cold northern sky to the countries that are loved
by the sun, where nature still lives in all its youthful
vigor, and glows in full luxuriance ; where the earth
preserves, as it were, a living museum of all the riches
which have elsewhere disappeared in the immense
succession of primitive ages. For this purpose we
will follow certain travellers upon whose reflections —
on the power of nature as manifested in the plants of

24 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

the tropics — both science and poetry have had their in-
fluence.

"Vegetation displays the most majestic forms un-
der the fiery rays which flood down from the tropical
heavens," says Humboldt in his " Pictures of Nature."
In the land of palms, in place of the meagre lichens
and mosses of the North, we have the cymbidium
and the fragrant vanilla hanging from the trunks of the
cashew nut and gigantic fig-trees. The fresh verdure of
the dracontium and the deeply indented leaves of the
pothos contrast with the brilliant colors of the orchids.
The creeping bauhinia, the passion flower, the yel-
low banisterias, interlace the trees of the forest and
throw their trailers far into the air. Delicate flowers
spring from the roots of the theobroma and from the
rough bark of the crescentia and the gustavia. In
the midst of the luxuriant vegetation, among the con-
fusion of creeping plants, the Naturalist has often dif-
ficulty in determining to what stem the flowers and
leaves before him belong. A single tree interlaced
by the paullinia, the bignonia and the dendrobium,
forms a group of plants which, if separated, would suf-
fice to cover a considerable space of ground.

" Tropical plants contain a great deal more sap, and
their leaves are much larger and more brilliant than
those of the North. The plants which minister to the
household wants of man, and render our vegetation so
uniform, do not form a feature in tropical vegetation,
which is consequently much more varied than ours.
Trees nearly twice the height of our oaks bear flowers
\vhich equal our lilies in size and in brilliancy. Upon

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 25

the umbrageous banks of the Rio Magdalena in South
America, grows a creeping aristolochia, the flowers of
which are four feet in circumference, so that the chil-
dren amuse themselves by making head-dresses of the
blossoms. The flower of the rafflesia is nearly three
feet in diameter and weighs nearly fifteen pounds.

" The extraordinary height to which not only the
mountains but whole countries rise at the equator, and
the depression of the temperature, which is the re-
sult of that elevation, enables the inhabitants of the
Torrid Zone to behold an extraordinary spectacle.
At the same moment that they see around them the
palms and bananas of the South, they are called upon
to notice a number of vegetable forms which ordina-
rily belong only to northern lands. The cypress, the
fir and the oak, the thorn and alders, very much like our
own, cover the plateaux of Southern Mexico and the
part of the Andes which crosses the equator. Thus na-
ture permits the inhabitant of the Torrid Zone to see
growing near each other all the vegetable forms of the
earth without leaving the place where he was born,
just as the vault of heaven displays to his view all
the world of life from the one pole to the other. These
enjoyments and many others are denied to the son of
the JSTorth. He never sees a large number of the stars,
nor does he ever behold many of the most beautiful
vegetable forms, such as the palms, the tree ferns, the
bananas, and the mimosas with their delicate feathery
leaves.

" The few sickly exotics which we raise in our
green-houses represent the majesty of tropical vege-

26 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

tation only very imperfectly ; but we find abundant
compensation in the beautiful language and the brilliant
imagination of the poet, and in the imitative art of
the painter which enables us to create a tropical world
of our own and pass in review before our mind the
living forms of exotic nature. In the cold climates of
the North, in the midst of sterile plains, man can ap-
propriate to himself the labors of others and enjoy at
home what the traveller has gone far to seek."

To this sketch, taken from one of the grand found-
ers of the science of the geography of plants, we will
add a few sentences from the gifted and painstaking
author of "Scenes of Nature under the Tropics,"
which are worthy to be placed by the side of the words
of the great master.

" Upon the banks of the lakes and the rivers," says
Denis, " the heat of the sun, calling into activity the
beneficent moisture of these vast reservoirs, produces
gigantic forms of vegetation. Trees which elsewhere
grow with difficulty, rise here majestically and embel-
lish the banks at the same time that they attest their
fertility. The Amazon, the Ganges, the Niger roll their
waters through vast forests which, being replaced from
age to age by new growth, have always resisted the ef-
forts of man. It seems indeed that Nature chooses the
banks of these immense rivers to display here a mag-
nificence unknown in other places. I have noticed
in South America, that the trees, rising to an im-
mense height near the rivers, give a peculiar aspect to
the forests. Not that in such places Nature presents
an appearance of absolute disorder ; on the contrary,

SOUTH AMERICAN SCENE.

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 29

it seems as if its strength and its grandeur have spe-
cially enabled it here to display a certain majestic reg-
ularity in vegetation. The trees, towering up to a
height that wearies the eyes, do not permit feeble
shrubs to grow underneath. But the vault of the for-
ests is raised higher ; the enormous trunks of the trees
which support it form immense porticoes and spread
out their branches with majesty. They are covered
at the top with a multitude of parasitical plants, which
seem to claim the air as their domain, and which
proudly mingle their flowers with the very top branch-
es. Here often upon the immense fig-tree, which is
itself unpretending in appearance, a flexible liane will
twist spirally around it, covering it with garlands,
and uniting it to all the great plants that grow around,
till at the utmost top it seems to defy the dazzling
splendor of the noon-tide before it once more descends
to embellish the mysterious recesses from which it
first sprang."

In the forests, which are less majestic and more
easily penetrated by the rays of the sun, vegetation
presents an astonishing variety and within much easi-
er reach. Among the travellers that have described
these forests in detail, perhaps no one is more exact
than the prince of Neu Wied.

"Everywhere life and vegetation abound without
limits," he says ; " and not the smallest space can be
found where there are no plants. On all the trunks
of the trees we see grenadillas, caladineas, pepper
and vanillas, etc., flourishing, climbing and twisting.
Some of the gigantic steins covered with flowers look

30 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

at a distance white, deep yellow, bright scarlet, rose
colored, violet or purple, even sky blue. In the
marshy places rise in compact groups the large and
beautiful elliptical leaves of the heliconia, which are
sometimes eight or ten feet in height, and bear for an
ornament extraordinary flowers of deep red or flame
color. Enormous bromelias, with countless flowers,
hold huge trees in deadly embrace, till they die after
a long struggle and suddenly fall thundering to the
ground. Thousands of creeping plants, from the
smallest size to the thickness of a man's thigh, with a
hard and compact wood, twist around trees, rise to
their summit and there flower and bear their fruit
without ever being seen by human eye. Some of
these plants, like certain banisteria, have forms so
singular that we cannot behold them without aston-
ishment. Sometimes the trunk around which these
plants have twined themselves dies and falls away in
dust. Then the huge stems of the parasites, strongly
interlaced, are seen supporting each other, clearly
showing their frail mutual support. It would be
very difficult to present a faithful picture of these
forests ; for it is not within the resources of art to
represent them as they are."

There is in the forests of the New World a har-
mony perfectly in accord with the phenomena pre-
sented to the view — as all is grand, imposing and
majestic ; the songs of the birds and the cries of the
different animals also have something savage and
melancholy in their utterance. Brilliant and sus-
tained cadences, cheerful chirpings, lively and gay

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 31

modulations, such as we hear in temperate zones, are
here less frequent — they are replaced by songs more
grave and measured. Now a voice is heard which
seems to imitate the far-sounding blow of the ham-
mer upon the anvil, and now a sound falls upon the
ear which resembles the sudden breaking of the
strings of a violin. All over the forest you hear
strange sounds which cause profound astonishment ;
but often at sunset, when the birds have ceased their
songs, there is heard from the highest tree-tops a
voice which would fill the traveller with fear if he
were ignorant of the cause. Murmurs like those of
the human voice announce that the guaritas (Simia
Beelzebub} are beginning one of their assemblies,
which are said to be held in honor of the setting sun.
Their howls, prolonged in the most lugubrious man-
ner, have caused credulous men to believe that these
animals are rendering homage to Satan and paying
him a tribute which he exacts. . These sounds, heard
at the hour when the day dies, are solemn and impos-
ing— they give a character of sadness to the scene.
If the jaguar and the black tiger roar, they fill the
forest with a sound which is majestic, but productive
also of uneasiness. Harmless animals hearing this
dreaded voice suddenly become silent, as if they feared
to mingle their utterances with those of the awful
master. If in addition to these sounds the wind be-
gins to blow violently, bending the lofty summits of
the trees, making the palms sigh as they bend low
and mingle their moans with the rustling of the
lianas, and losing itself finally in the sombre depths

;}'2 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

of the primitive forests, then the sounds become so
sad and mournful that admiration gives way to terror.
Of the great plants which attract the attention of
the traveller and impart to the vegetation of the
tropics an altogether foreign aspect in the eyes of the
foreigner, we will select the most remarkable, whether
from their beauty and size or from the service which
they are made to render to the natives. The latter
aspect will be of special value to us, for it will give
us an idea of the power 'and spontaneousness with
which nature here proceeds in her work — supplies all
that is needed, and incessantly gives new beauty to
life. To mention only one example in direct connec-
tion with the descriptions which follow, we will re-
mind the reader that if plants and animals are the
natural food of man, that food must needs vary ac-
cording to the countries which he inhabits. Where
a certain mode of life is no longer possible because
of climate and soil, that mode of life is changed ; but
life itself is not suspended on that account. To
maintain life is the supreme aim of all the forces of
Nature, and her law is to manifest herself under all
possible forms. In northern countries the cereals,
and wheat and corn in particular, supply our daily
bread, while wine, beer, cider are the drinks accord-
ing to the various countries. But in order that the
wheat may ripen there must be frost during the win-
ter ; otherwise it grows rank and bears no seed. Now
in warm countries there is no winter; the seasons,
distinctly marked in northern latitudes, become ef-
faced in proportion as we approach the equator, and

FOREST IN BRAZIL.

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 35

in the tropics neither wheat nor any other cereal will
thrive ; but are these countries on that account unin-
habitable ? By no means. When wheat no longer
ripens, other vegetables take its place ; trees furnish
our daily bread and wine in their fruit ; milk flows
in the shape of creamy, sap and the fruits of northern
countries are replaced by those of another climate.
Let us select the characteristic types of these valuable
plants, and if we cannot see them in their own coun-
try let us at least call them up before our mind's eye
and make them tell us their own history.

Bread-Tree of Tahiti.

CHAPTEE III.

THE BREAD-FRUIT-TREE.

WE will commence this portion of our task by
mentioning certain extraordinary plants, which
in countries essentially different from our own in soil
and climate, are made use of by the natives to supply
those wants which are supplied among us by means
of certain domestic animals, or by mechanical con-
trivances, put into daily operation. There is one re-
markable family in the kingdom of Flora, of which
some members furnish leavened bread, others a supply
of milk, equal to the best cow-milk, and still others
the most fearful poison as yet known to man. The
useful members are the bread-fruit-tree, the milk-tree,

TEE WONDERS OF VEGETATION". 37

and those which supply limpid water or some strength-
ening beverage to the traveller.

As bread is the staff of life, we will give the place
of honor to a fig-tree, which actually grows bread for
our antipodes in Oceanica, and thus renders unneces-
sary the toils of the sower, the reaper, the miller, and
the baker.

The ancients loved to consider Nature as an indi-
vidual being, apart from the world, endowed with
reason and will, and constantly spoke of her in prose
and poetry as the " Universal Mother," and she well
deserves this beautiful name, by her conduct toward all
living things, and especially by the motherly affection
with which she provides for the numberless children
to whom she is incessantly opening the gates of exist-
ence. For what else are the rays of the sun calling
forth life upon the hill- slopes ; the rain falling softly
on meadow and prairie, and even the warm carpet of
snow which winter spreads over the frozen earth ;
the dew of morning and the vapory mists of evening
— what are they but so many evidences of the tender-
ness of our mother Nature — or rather the watchful-
ness of Divine Providence. But apart from these
cares bestowed impartially and without distinction
upon all existing things, the philosophical traveller
discovers, every now and then, special instances which
reveal to us more pointedly this marvellous goodness
of Providence, than the general working of the ab-
stract laws of nature.

Among the examples which in a special degree
attest the watchful care of Providence, we have to

38 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

mention that of the bread-tree, discovered in the isle
of Oceanica. This invaluable tree belongs to the ge-
nus Artocarpus^ of the fig family. The leaves in
this family are simple, plain or serrated, and the flow-
ers very small and imperfect, some having no corolla,
and others no calix, but all appearing alike upon the
same tree at the extremities of the branches.

The true bread-tree has indented or serrated leaves.
We say the true bread-tree, for this genius embraces
many other species, which, in spite of a very remark-
able organization, do not possess the properties of the
one we have mentioned. Thus there is an Artocar-
pus incisa, with small leaves and flowers, but bear-
ing fruits which are, perhaps, the largest borne by
any tree on earth. These round fruits are sometimes
so large that a man cannot lift them ! The kernels
are eaten, roasted like chestnuts, but they are not easily
digestible. Then there is the Jack (Artocarpus in-
tegrifoUa), of the Indian Archipelago, with a huge
trunk, and dense foliage on the broad-branching sum-
mit, while the fruit measures 18 inches by 15. Trav-
ellers are not agreed as to the merits of the latter.
Rheede says they have an agreeable taste and odor,
but Commerson could not summon courage even to
put a morsel of it in his mouth. " Tastes differ," but
it seems difficult to explain such contradictory opin-
ions, unless it should be that these travellers speak of
such trees as certain critics are said to judge of works
which they have never seen. A third species is the
Artocarpus hvrsuta, the tallest of the genus. Its
wood is used in carpentery, and in boat-building.

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 41

The Indians hollow out the trunk to make their pi-
raguas, some of which measure 80 feet in length by
nine in width, and thus enable them to make long
ocean voyages.

We return to the true bread-fruit-tree. The dis-
coveries in Oceanica have rendered it celebrated, and
special expeditions have been undertaken for the pur-
pose of obtaining roots for transplantation in different
parts of the Old and New World. We shall presently
notice the most remarkable of these expeditions. The
following are the distinctive characteristics of this tree :

The trunk is straight, as thick as a man's body,
and rises in a gentle spiral to the height of about 40 feet.
Its large round top covers with its shadow a space 30
feet in diameter. The wood is yellowish, soft and
light. The leaves, 1-J feet long and one foot wide, large
and permeated with seven or eight lobes, a form which
characterizes this species. The same branch bears
male and female flowers. The bread obtained from
the tree is its globular fruit, larger than a child's
head, weighing three to four pounds, and rough on the
outside, covered with hair. The thick green rind en-
closes a pulp, which, during the month that precedes
maturity, is white, farinaceous, and slighly fibrous ;
but when ripe, changes in color and consistency, and
becomes yellow and succulent or gelatinous. The
island of Otaheiti abounds in the best kind of these
trees, which bear fruit without seed ; the other islands
of Oceanica produce varieties of less valuable bread-
fruit, containing angular seeds almost as large as
chestnuts.

42 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

The fruit of this tree ripens during eight consecu-
tive months in the year. The islanders live upon it
as we do upon our manufactured bread — it is their
main food, and nature as we see furnishes it to them
without their being put to the trouble of cultivating
the ground, of sowing, reaping, threshing, grinding
or baking. To have their " fresh bread " they choose
the time when the pulp is farinaceous, which they
can teU by the green color of the rind. The neces-
sary preparation " for the table " is accomplished by
cutting them in thick slices and cooking them upon
a charcoal fire ; when ready, each " loaf" weighs about
a pound. They are sometimes also placed upon a
heated oven, as we do with pastry, and left there
until the rind begins to blacken. Then the burnt
part is scraped clean, as your toast, and the interior is
white, ready to be eaten, tender as the crumbs of
French rolls, but little differing in taste from wheaten
bread, except only a slight flavor suggestive of the in-
side of an artichoke. As the natives want bread
throughout the whole year, they take advantage of
the time when the fruits are abundant and prepare
from the pulp of the surplus fruit a paste which, after
being fermented, can be kept a long time without
turning sour. During the four months when the
trees do not yield, the natives live upon this prepara-
tion.

The expedition to which we referred was that
made by Captain Bligh, sent in search of the bread-
tree of Otaheiti for the purpose of introducing it

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 43

into the tropical colonies of Great Britain to furnish
food for the slaves.

The narratives of Cook and other explorers had
encouraged the highest expectations of the benefits
which would result from the culture of the bread-fruit-
tree. The English colonists entreated their govern-
ment to obtain for them this wonderful tree ; a vessel
specially fitted for the purpose was got ready and
placed under the command of Bligh, then only a lieu-
tenant, but afterwards an admiral. The selection of
the commander was judicious ; for Bligh had accom-
panied Cook in his voyages and given on many occa-
sions proofs of his talents and his gallantry. Leaving
England in 1787, the expedition arrived in six months
at Otaheiti. The islanders received them hospitably ;
more than a thousand plants were put in pots and
boxes and taken on board, with a sufficient quantity
of fresh water to keep them alive, and five months
afterwards the precious cargo was floating towards its
destination. But in spite of all the happy auspices
under which the return voyage was begun, it had an
unfortunate ending. It furnished one of those ex-
amples, happily rare, of the revolt of a crew and
the desperate position of a captain left to the mercy
of the mutineers in the midst of the silent ocean.
Twenty-two days after they had left Otaheiti the
greater part of the crew having joined in a most
cowardly plot, seized Bligh during the night and
placed him with the eighteen that remained faithful to
him in a long boat with some provisions and instru-
ments, and leaving them alone in the middle of the

44 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

ocean, sailed off and were soon out of sight. Bligh
and his companions bore up with superhuman cour-
age in the midst of their fatigue and sufferings ;
only one succumbed. They arrived at the island of
Timor after having sailed the distance of 3,600 nau-
tical miles in the long boat. The Dutch governor
received them kindly, and soon twelve of them were
able to take passage to Ireland. Bligh obtained justice
in England ; he was immediately promoted to the
rank of captain and placed in charge of a new and
larger expedition. This time he succeeded completely,
and two years after the two vessels of the expedition
landed in the British West Indies, having on board
1,200 plants of the bread-fruit-tree, and without hav-
ing lost a single man of either of the crews.

The slaves of the West Indies did not show as
much alacrity in making use of the fruit as had been
expected, preferring their familiar food, the banana ;
on the other hand, the Europeans accepted it with great
pleasure. It ought to be stated, however, that the
slaves eat the fruit without having previously pre-
pared it, while the Europeans cooked it according to
the best receipts of English writers.

The old people of Otaheiti attribute the origin of
the bread-fruit-tree to an incident which is embodied
in a touching legend.

At a time of great scarcity, a father assembled his
numerous children upon the mountains and said to
them : " You will inter me in this place ; but you will
find me again on the morrow."

The children obeyed, and coming on the following

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 45

day as they had been commanded, they were much
surprised to see that the body of their father had been
transformed into a great tree. His toes had stretched
out to form the roots ; his powerful and robust body
had furnished the trunk, his outstretched arms were
changed into branches, and his hands into leaves. His
bald head finally had disappeared, and a delicious fruit
was found in its place.

This legend recalls the seventh circle of the Infer-
no of Dante, where the souls who had been violent
upon earth are seen changed into living trees, while
their limbs writhe and twist like the branches of dead
trees. But we prefer the simple legend of the primi-
tive isles to the gloomy imagination of the great Ital-
ian ; the poet speaks of the dead, the islanders appeal
to the living.

THE MILK TREE.

Ever since the discovery of the New World by
Columbus, explorers have been hard at work to become
familiar with the new countries which were opened
up before them, and to publish descriptions of the new
forms of life both in the animal and the vegetable
kingdom. If we were to believe all the marvellous
narratives of the early times, from Marco Polo to Ma-
gellan, we might easily place in our Book of Wonders
men with dog-heads and trees gifted with the powers
of speech. But we do not mean here to repeat those
fables ; we are interested only in natural and actual
wonders. As early as the year 1505 many remarkable
plants and animals had already been described truth-

46 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

fully, but some rare species were for a long time over-
looked, though they belong to the countries first dis-
covered and though they ought to have attracted at-
tention by the special features by which they are dis-
tinguished. To this number belongs the cow-tree,
the arbre d lait (milk-tree) of the French. This tree
is one of the most remarkable of Central America, and
yet it was not known to Europe as late as the begin-
ning of the present century. It was on the 1st of
March, 1800, that Humboldt and Bonpland observed it
on the Barbula Farm during their expedition to the
valleys of Aragua.

Cow-Tree.

An ancient writer, Lact, had mentioned it briefly
in his Novus orbis : "In the province of Cumana,"
says he, " there are trees which, when their bark is
pierced, pour out an aromatic resin ; while others yield
a juice, which resembles curdled milk, fit for food."

This solitary observation is obviously vei-y ineom-

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 47

plete, and it was left for Humboldt to describe the tree.
We quote the passage : —

" While these trees present the remarkable feature
of furnishing man with his bread all ready made by
the benevolent hand of Nature, he seeks his daily
bread in other less favored regions in every plant
that grows around him. From the lofty bread-tree
through the whole scale of trees and shrubs and lowly
plants, there are but few which he has not learned to
convert into nourishing food ; and when at last the
earth seems to refuse him further aid, he digs beneath
the surface or dives into the water to bring back with
him the desired supply. One of the most remarkable
plants of the latter class is the Edible Arum (Colo-
casia Fsculenta], the roots of which, if properly pre-
pared, furnish a palatable dish. But the plant has
another and even more striking peculiarity. It liter-
ally distils water and launches tiny drops in the form
of a jet from the pores at the end of its magnificent,
heart-shaped leaves. A careful and ingenious observer
ascertained that from 10 to 100 drops of water were
thrown every minute to a distance of an inch and
more."

" In returning from Porto Cabello we rested at
the Barbula plantation. We had heard for some
weeks about a tree -the juice of which was milk fit
for food. The tree was called Palo de Yaca, and we
were assured that the negroes of the plantation large-
ly used this vegetable milk, regarding it as healthy
and nutritious. As all milky juices of plants are
acrid, bitter, and more or less poisonous, this assertion

48 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

seemed to us very extraordinary. Experience has
however proved that the virtues of the cow-tree had
not been overrated. When incisions are made in
the trunk of the tree, it gives forth a glutinous milk,
rather thick, free from all acidity, and exhaling a very
agreeable odor. We were offered some of it in cala-
bashes, and drank considerable draughts of it both that
night before retiring to rest, and early in the morning,
without experiencing any unpleasant effects. The
viscous quality of the milk was the only thing un-
pleasant about it. The negroes and free men who
work on the plantations drink it, soaking in it corn
cakes and cassava. The manager of the farm assured
us that the slaves became sensibly fatter during the
season when the cow-tree furnishes them the largest
supply of milk."

" Among the numerous interesting phenomena
presented to me during my . expedition," continues
Humboldt, " few things made a more vivid impres-
sion upon my imagination than the appearance of the
cow-tree. Every thing that relates to milk or concerns
cereals awakens within us an interest which is not
merely of a scientific character, but which connects
itself with another order of ideas and sentiments. It
is hardly possible to conceive of the human race exist-
ing without farinaceous substances, or without that
nutritious liquid which springs from the mother's
breasts, and which is so admirably suited to the infant
in the weakness of its early youth. Farinaceous mat-
ter is found not only in grain but also in many roots,
and even in the trunks of certain trees, as in the sago

MILK TREE OF GUT AN A.

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 51

palm. But as to milk, we are accustomed to look
upon it as solely an animal product. Such are the
impressions which we have received from our infancy,
and this was the source of the astonishment which seized
us at the first sight of the cow-tree.

In Caracas, South America, there grows upon the
dry face of a rock a tree the leaves of which are dry
and barklike ; its great roots penetrate with difficulty
into the earth. During many months of the year not a
shower moistens its foliage — the branches appear dead
and withered, but when the trunk is pierced a sweet
and nourishing milk flows forth. The supply of the
liquid is most abundant at sunrise. At that hour the
blacks and the natives, furnished with large pitchers to
receive the milk, which is yellow and gradually thickens
on the surface, arrive at the cow-trees from all quar-
ters. Some drink their supply on the spot, others
carry it away to their children. We might fancy
that we beheld the family of a patriarch who is dis-
tributing the milk of his herd.

The milk-yielding plants belong, mainly, to three
families of Euphorbiacese, UrticeaB and Apocynese, but
in the juice of almost all of these acrid and deleterious
elements are to be found, from which the milk of the
cow-tree is free. Still there are some species of Eu-
phorbia and Asclepias which also yield milk that is
sweet and harmless. Thus in the Canaries we find
the Tabaila (Euphorbia lalsamifera) mentioned by
Pliny as Ferula, and as giving out, when pressed, a
liquor agreeable to the taste ; at Ceylon is found a
lactiferous Asclepias, the milk of which is used when

52 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

cow's milk cannot be had, while the leaves are used
in cooking such food as is elsewhere prepared with
cow's milk.

This natural vegetable milk offers besides other
points of affinity and resemblance to natural milk.
Thus, placed in the open air, in a short time a yellow-
ish, thick membrane appears on the surface, not unlike
the little skin that forms on milk, and this continues
to thicken and is taken off, to be kept under the name
of cheese often for a week. Nature, however, also
takes to churning herself occasionally. On the banks
of the Niger, the natives gather 'their butter directly
from a tree (Pentadesma ~butyracea) and sell it in
their markets. It is said that the kings of Dahomey,
fearing its value as an article of export, and thus as a
means of bringing the land into relations with more
civilized countries, have ordered it to be extermina-
ted ! It is annually burnt by royal decree — it annu-
ally springs up again defying the decrees of the cruel
sovereigns.

Although many kinds of lactiferous plants furnish
caoutchouc, not a trace of it is found in the product
of the cow-tree; and the cheese of which we have
spoken are not very different from our own. In
chemical analysis the tree milk bears a close affinity
to animal milk ; the butter is represented in the veg-
etable milk by a beautiful and abundant wax, caseine,
by a substance not unlike the fibrine of blood, and the
serum by a watery liquid containing a little sugar
and a small percentage of the salt of magnesia.
Placed over the fire vegetable milk undergoes the same

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 53

modification as animal milk. A cream forms on the
surface which cannot easily be taken off; the milk boils
up and shows a tendency to run over from the vessel
which contains it. If the cream is removed as it
forms, and a steady heat is kept up, the milk gradu-
ally assumes the consistency of paste ; then appear upon
the surface oily rings, like those which come Jbo the
surface of cream that has been upon the fire for some
time. Finally, this fat part envelopes the whole of
the posset, which then diffuses an odor exactly similar
to that of roast beef.

The tree is found chiefly in the valleys of Cauca-
gua, in the Cordilleras, near the sea-coast, and in the
vicinity of the lake of Valencia. At Caucagua the
natives name it the " Arbo de leche " (milk-tree), and
assert that they can tell by the color and the thickness
of the leaves which trees contain the juice in the great-
est abundance, precisely as the farmer tells by certain
marks the good qualities of a milch cow.

In 1829, Smith, the traveller, while passing through
the woods of Guiana, made special search for the tree
which had been described by Humboldt, and inquired
of all the guides if they could tell him any thing of
such a tree. He had already met milk-giving plants,
but the bitter taste of their sap was utterly unlike
milk. One day finding himself in a little Indian vil-
lage near the first rapids of the River Demerary, he
heard reports of a tree called the hya-hya, whose milk,
it was said, was nourishing and agreeable to the taste.
Determined to ascertain the fact, the traveller sent an
Indian in search of one of these trees. The Indian

54 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

not only found the tree, but cut it down, and the
creek, across which it had fallen, was whitened by its
milk. A knife stuck into the bark immediately
brought forth a stream of sap, which the Indian drank
eagerly. Smith drank after the Indian, and found the
milk excellent. "It was," he says, "thicker and
richer than cow-milk, entirely free from bitterness,
and the only slightly unpleasant feature was, that af-
ter drinking my lips felt slightly viscous. As I
passed the night in the village," the traveller contin-
ues, " I had in the morning a glass of this milk for
my coffee, and it proved such a good substitute for
cow-milk that no one could have told the difference ;
for the slight viscousness which I had noticed in tast-
ing it before, disappeared when it was mixed with the
coffee."

The milk flows more freely if the opening made
is transverse or oblique, than if it is longitudinal.
The bark of the hya-hya is gray, rather rough, and
has to be cut completely through in order to make
the milk flow. This tree is very different from the
other cow-tree. Its leaves are elliptical, and grow in
couples. The chemical composition of the milk also
differs — it is not equally nourishing.

Besides these remarkable species of milk-producing
trees belonging to America, a milk-tree not less remark-
able, called Masaranduba, by the Indians, is found in
the port of Para (Brazil). It is one of the largest
trees in the Brazilian forests, and furnishes a wood
highly prized for ship-building. The tree blooms in
February and yields a delicious fruit, the taste of which

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 55

recalls that of strawberries eaten with fresh cream.
From an incision made in the trunk a white milk
pours forth, perfectly liquid, agreeable to the taste and
without any odor. The natives habitually live upon
it. The officers of the Chanticleer, whose surgeon,
Mr. Webster, was the first to discover this tree, con-
stantly used it during their stay in the ports, like or-
dinary milk, both in tea and coffee.

This tree is very tall ; its bark is dark brown and
the leaves are large and oval.

The crew of the Chanticleer having kept some
of this milk in bottles, found that at the end of two
months it had separated into two parts, the one
liquid, light yellow, and with a slightly sour odor, the
other solid, white and insipid, insoluble in water or in
alcohol. This substance would burn easily, giving
forth a brilliant green flame ; it appeared to consist
for the most part of wax, and contained none of the
animal matter which abounds to such an extent in the
coagulated parts of the milk of the polo de vaca or
cow-tree.

This milk-bearing tree, at first and still quite com-
monly called Galactodendron dulce, is in reality the
same tree as the polo de vaca, now known by its bo-
tanical name of Brosimum Galactodendron, and be-
longs to the family of fig-trees. There are, however,
on the coast several other trees which give forth
milky juices and are often confounded with the lat-
ter. For instance, in the neighborhood of Maracaibo,
the Clusia Galactodendron pours forth a milky
stream very agreeable to the taste ; but the milk is

56 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

not of equally good quality, cannot be as easily purified,
and leaves an unpleasant resinous matter behind in-
stead of wax ; still others, like the Hura Crepitans,
are actually poisonous, and the sap is employed to
poison the waters of rivers for the purpose of killing
the fish.

THE MANNA-TREE.

During the intense heat of the month of August,
when the sap is abundant, this tree furnishes a nutri-
tive substance of slightly bitter taste. It is a natural
secretion of the plant, and has procured for it the
name which recalls the miraculous food of the Israel-
ites in the desert. Manna is a liquid substance as
clear as water, and flows from the tree, if about the
middle of August an incision is made in the bark.
Generally the tirst cut is made near the foot of the
tree ; and each day a new incision is added two inches
above the last and so on up to the lower' branches.
These cuts, generally made with a pruning-knife or
carpenter's chisel, are usually two inches in length
and half an inch deep.

At first the sap flows abundantly, like a liquid
stream ; at the end of a month it becomes thicker
and flows less freely. The rainy season interrupts it
altogether, and towards the end of September the
heat of the day is no longer sufficiently powerful to
make the sap rise, which gradually recedes to the
lowest parts of the tree.

The manna gradually loses its slightly bitter
taste which it had when taken from the tree ; the

MANNA TREE

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 59

watery particles evaporate, and its taste becomes even
insipid and not at all appetizing.

This tree (Fraximus ornus) belongs to the same
genus as the common ash, and is a native of Sicily and
the south of Italy. Its normal height is 20 feet ; at
first view it might be taken for a young elm, but the
appearance of the leaves clearly mark it as a differ-
ent species. There are three varieties known ; the
leaves of the first are long and straight like peach
leaves ; those of the second resemble the leaves of
the rose, while on the third variety they partake of
the appearance of both the former.

The manna of Calabria is highly esteemed, and
the most renowned kind grown there is that from the
gardens of (Enotria. A popular tradition exists in
the district to the effect" that the kings of Naples
having intended to enclose these gardens in order to
raise a tax from the cultivation of manna, the latter
suddenly ceased to flow, as if the trees had been
struck with sterility, and they remained in this con-
dition until the unjust impost had been removed.

It need hardly be added that the manna of the
Israelites was in no way connected with the ash-tree
of our day. What is now called manna by the Arab,
is a gum from the tarfa or tamarisk shrub (Tamarix
gattica), and the real manna of the Israelites has never
yet been ascertained.

It is, however, by no means necessary for us to go
to far distant lands in order to see what marvels na-
ture .displays by means of the simple sap which rest-
lessly moves, like the blood of man, through every

CO THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

vein and artery of plants. In our own country, and
strangely enough, in its most northern parts, we de-
rive from this sap one of the most valuable products
of the whole vegetable kingdom. Our sugar maple
(Acer saccharinum\ when tapped at the proper season,
pours forth its liquid sweetness at the rate of a bucket-
ful a day. This fluid, evaporated by gentle heat,
yields a brown, luscious syrup, which is afterwards con-
verted into diminutive sugar-cakes, and enters largely
into home-consumption as maple-sugar throughout
the whole northern portion of our Union.

THE TRAVELLER'S TREE— ( Urania Speciosd).

This remarkable tree is found only on the island
of Madagascar ; it belongs to the Musacese and to
the same family of which the banana, the plantains
and the brilliant flowered strelitsias are members.
Unlike other palm-trees, they grow better in the
interior than upon the sea-shore ; and their appearance
produces an agreeable diversity among the bamboos,
with their feathery-tufted clusters.

Travellers are unanimous in their grateful admira-
tion for this tree, which, hence, has obtained the pet
name of the Traveller's Tree. We are told that it
grows principally in regions where there is no water,
and that it has the admirable property of secreting for
travellers a limpid and refreshing supply of water. Its
large white leaves curve back towards the main trunk
and thus form cavities in which the water is gathered
and kept for the thirsty wayfarer. Some travellers have,
however, failed to meet with this hospitable wonder

TRAVELLERS TREE.

THE WONDEE8 OF VEGETATION. 63

of plants. Miss Ida Pfeiffer, who has been three times
around the world, was unable to ascertain the facts ;
she even states that the natives of the country are not
agreed on the subject, and assert that this tree only
grows on moist soil. The Island of Madagascar is
not yet sufficiently explored for botanists to be able
to add their conclusive verdict upon its vegetable
productions. On the other hand, there can be no
doubt that a real weeping-tree (Caesalpima pluviosa)
was seen some years ago in one of the Canary Islands,
from the tufted foliage of which water fell like copi-
ous rain.

THE KAFFIA PALMS.

The raffia palms are more elegant ; their long
leaves are curved back as if to adorn with their graceful
arabesques the summit of these lofty columns, which
resemble the pillars of an edifice. Comparing this ar-
rangement with the manner of building in the East,
we are involuntarily led to believe that this vegetable
architecture has furnished the original type of By-
zantine architecture. The harmony of this natural
temple seems to invite the mind to meditation and
prayer, even more effectually than the Gothic stone
arches which close the vault above us and prevent
the aspirations of our hearts from rising heavenwards.
In these palms every thing is of colossal size — a fact
which we can, perhaps, best realize by seeing the
smthe or envelope which protects the young flower,
used as a cradle! Growing frequently to the size
of a large cup nearly two yards long, it is used for

64: THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

various purposes. In the accompanying illustra-
tion the thick, woody spathe of a large palm is thus
made to serve as a bath for the children of native

women.

The Palm.

CHAPTER IY.

PALM-TREES. THE DATE.

A FTER the trees of which we have spoken and
""• which are mainly remarkable for their singularity,
it is but right that we should begin our description of
the vegetable world with the illustrious and ancient
family of palms.

The " dynasty of palms," to use an expression of
Linngeus, reigns over the tropical regions of our earth
and occupies the highest rank among plants. This
supremacy is due to them on account of their rich
foliage, their beauty and elegance, and still more on
account of the important services which they render
the inhabitants of the Tropics. For these palms act-

68 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

ually supply the wants of their existence, furnishing
besides bread, oil, wine, also clothing and the common
tools and materials for building. Moreover, the palm
is a holy tree to many races : to the Mohammedans
the date palm is sacred as the fruit which Adam was
permitted to bring with him out of Eden — by the
Christian all palms are revered as having furnished
the leaves which were strewn in the path of the
Messiah.

In their form,- aspect and structure, these plants
differ essentially from, those of our country. A single
stem, straight and slender, rises to a height of 45, 60,
or even 75 feet, perfectly bare, unbroken by a single
branch or leaf. At the top only an immense plume
of feathery leaves, growing in a bunch, forms, so to
speak, the capital of the vegetable column. This
tuft may be from nine to twelve feet long, and at the
roots of its long leaves appear the fruits of the palm-
tree. This short description applies especially to the
date palm, well known as the " prince of palms," and
hence as the prince of all plants.

Originally a native of Arabia and Northern Africa,
the date palm is pre-eminently the tree of the desert,
where it grows in nearly every oasis, and by its re-
freshing shade, its fruits, its milk, and its general use-
fulness, has won the affection of the natives and the
admiring sympathy of all travellers.

The date, says Mr. Ch. Martins, is the true friend
of the desert ; there alone it ripens its fruit ; and with-
out it the Sahara would be uninhabitable. Arabic
poetry loves to praise it as a living being created by

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 69

God on the sixth day of creation, at the same time with
man, to convey an idea of the conditions under which
it thrives. The Saharans use a bold but expressive fig-
ure : " The king of the oasis," they say, " must plunge
his feet in the water and his head in the fire of heaven."
Science confirms this assertion in a manner, for it is
proved that it requires 9.180° of accumulated heat,
spread over eight months, to bring the fruits of the
date to maturity.

" The climate of the Sahara fulfils these condi-
tions," adds the great botanist. " The mean tem-
perature required is from 68 to 73° according to
locality. The heat commences in April and contin-
ues to October. During the summer the thermometer
reaches 113° and even 125° in the shade. The winter
is relatively cold. Dates can endure dry and short
cold as low -as 21° above zero and a heat of 122°. The
radiating sand of the desert cools off more readily than
the air, and preserves, at a certain depth, a degree of
freshness which invigorates the roots of the trees.
Rain is rare in the Sahara ; it falls only in winter and
woos the withered plants to a new life. Sometimes
it rains in torrents ; but these gusts are of short dura-
tion. At Tougourt and Ouargla, whole years pass with-
out a drop of rain. Hence the very natural admira-
tion of the Arab for this tree with its sweet fruits,
which grows in the sand, fed by brackish waters that
would be fatal to almost all other plants ; which re-
mains flourishing and green when all around is burnt
up by the fierce rays of a pitiless sun ; which resists
the winds that may bend its pliant plume to the

70 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

ground but cannot break its strong stipe, composed of
interlaced fibres, nor tear it from the soil to which it
clings by a thousand roots that strike deep and defy
the tempest. It has well been said that a single tree
has peopled the desert, and upon it alone is based a
civilization, rudimentary compared to our own, but far
advanced beyond the merely natural state. Its fruits
are in demand throughout the whole world, suffice to
procure all necessary imposts, and not only make the
Arabs independent but affluent." In the 360 oases
which belong to France, each date-tree is taxed from
20 to 60 centimes, according to the oasis, and their cul-
tivation pays, for the mean produce of each tree is val-
ued at about three francs.

We learn also from Martins that in order to obtain
the milk of the date the Arabs of Tougourt employ the
following means : They take off the crown of leaves,
sparing only the lower ones. The section has the form
of a cone, and into this a reed is then inserted, through
which the liquid runs out into a vessel, which in its
turn is emptied into another suspended from the leaves
of the tree. The palm does not always die after the
mutilation, — the terminal bud grows out again, and the
tree gradually recovers and nourishes again. The
process however cannot be repeated oftener than three
times.

The tufts of palm-trees form a kind of vast parasol,
under which the air can circulate ; but the sun is unable
to pierce the dense canopy of leaves. Shade, air and
water are the three elements which permit the culti-

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 71

vation of many plants in palm gardens in spite of the
burning heat of summer.

An oasis of palms is a veritable paradise in the
burning waste of the desert. Such an oasis is graph-
ically described in the narrative of Mr. Martins, who
once accidentally discovered a clump of these marvel-
lous trees during his passage across the Eastern Saha-
ra. " The boundless desert," he says, " was stretching
out before me. The sun, high above the round hori-
zon,— round as we see it on the ocean when out of sight
of land — seemed the only living thing in the midst of
death. All at once I perceived the summits of palms,
the trunks of which were not yet visible. I thought
it an illusion — a mirage. We drew nearer — the tufts
became more distinct, but the trunks could not yet be
seen. The caravan halts near a well. I hasten toward
the palms and find they are planted at the bottom of
a trough nearly 24 feet in depth. The sand had been
raised on all sides ; a feeble palisade of palm leaves
helped to keep it up on one side, on the other sides
crystals of sulphate of lime of all sizes and shapes, ar-
ranged as we see them in collections of minerals, helped
to fix the shifting sand. At the bottom of the trough
the dates were planted irregularly ; but this was not
the slender, elegant palm of the painter. These were
trees with short, thick trunks of cylindrical form ; look-
ing for all the world like the short, massive columns
of an Egyptian temple, or of a moorish mosque. Sur-
face roots, joining the lower part of the trunk to the soil,
formed a pedestal for these columns, and the lofty tufts
on high resembled exactly the vast colonnades of an-

72 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

cient temples. In the evening, when penetrating
under the sombre vaults of these palms, I could not
resist a feeling of awe ; for these palms, majestic and
immovable at the bottom of their crater of sand were
a fit emblem of African civilization, unchanging amid
the ever-changing outside world.

The family of palms is very numerous, and the
different species which belong to it (450 have been
counted) are of remarkable interest, both on account
of their strange beauty and of the valuable services
which they render to man. As the limits of this
work do not permit us to examine all these treasures,
we must content ourselves with a few that are most
worthy of the interest and curiosity of our readers.

THE COCOA-NUT TREE.

Like the date-palm-tree, rises to a height of 90 feet,
with a straight and smooth stem crowned with a cap-
ital of leaves in the shape of a plume — each leaf be-
ing about 18 feet long. It is met with throughout
the whole Torrid Zone, but abounds chiefly near the
sea-coast. All the wants of man, in his primitive con-
dition, are supplied by a cocoa-nut palm — by its fruit,
its seeds, its leaves, and the other parts of the plant.
The following narrative, by M. Boniface Guizot, will
give an excellent idea of the importance and the na-
ture of its usefulness to man.

A traveller was journeying through those coun-
tries lying under a burning sun, where the freshness
of shade is rare and the habitations of man are found
only at considerable distances from each other. Sink-

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 73

ing with fatigue, the exhausted traveller beheld a hut
surrounded by trees with tall straight stems, sur-
mounted by a bunch of great leaves, some standing
upright, others hanging down gracefully and present-
ing a beautiful and elegant appearance. Nothing
else near this cabin spoke of cultivation. Encouraged
by this sight, the traveller made a last struggle,
reached the hut, and was kindly received under the
hospitable roof. First his host offers him a slightly
acid drink, which quenched his thirst and refreshed
him. When the stranger had rested himself awhile,
the Indian invited him to partake of his repast,
and -he served different dishes on a brown platter
shining brightly and highly polished ; he offered him
also a wine possessing an extremely pleasant flavor.
Towards the end of the repast he brought a quantity
of excellent comfits, and invited him to try an excel-
lent kind of brandy. The traveller in astonishment
asked the Indian how, in the midst of this desert, he
came by all these things.

" I get them from my cocoa-nut trees," answered
the Indian. " The water which I gave you on your
arrival was drawn from the fruit before it had be-
come ripe, and sometimes the nut contains three or
four pounds of it. This palatable nut is the fruit at
its maturity ; this milk, which you find so pleasant,
is drawn from the same ripe fruit ; this delicate cab-
bage is made from the top leaves of the tree ; but we
do not often indulge in this, as the tree, when its top
is thus cut off, dies soon after. This wine, which
pleases you so much, is also got from the cocoa. We

74 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

make an incision in the tender flower stalks and a
white liquor flows forth, which we gather into ves-
sels and which is known as palm wine. Exposed to
the sim it becomes sour and turns into vinegar.
When we distil it we obtain this excellent brandy,
which you have tasted. The same juice has also fur-
nished me with the sugar which I needed for pre-
serving the nut. Finally, all these dishes and uten-
sils which we are using on the table are made from
the shells of the cocoa-nuts. This is not all — my
house even I owe to these invaluable trees ; their
wood has enabled me to build my cabin ; their leaves,
dried and interwoven, make the roof; and these same
leaves made into a parasol protect me from the sun
when I walk out. These clothes which I wear are
woven with the flbre-threads got from the leaves.
Those sieves were ready made in the parts of the
tree from which the leaves spring, and these mats
come from the same source. These same leaves
woven into a tissue make sails for our ships. The
coarse hair which covers the nut is used for calk-
ing ships, as it lasts forever and swells when ex-
posed to the water. Cables, ropes and twine are all
made of the same material. Finally, the delicate oil
with which many of these dishes were seasoned and
which burns in my lamp, is obtained by pressing the
freshly-gathered fruit."

The stranger listened with astonishment and won-
der as the poor Indian showed him thus, that a single
variety of palms furnished him not only all the ne-
cessaries but many of the luxuries of life. When

TEE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 75

the traveller was about to leave the cabin the host
said to him :

" I wish to write to a friend in town, be good
enough to carry my letter for me, I pray ! "

" Most certainly ; and is the cocoa to furnish you
also your writing materials ? "

" Certainly," answered the Indian ; " from the saw-
dust of the branches I have made this ink, and from
the leaves this parchment, which formerly was exclu-
sively used for public documents and records of im-
portant events."

THE LAQBY

At the time when the return of spring gives mo-
tion to the sluggish sap of the trees, a man mounts
to the top of a date palm, climbing up the stem with
no other assistance than what he obtains from his
naked feet, and a cord passed round his waist and
round the tree. He is armed with a very sharp
hatchet. Arrived at the top, from which the rich
plume of leaves rises proudly, he begins to hack away,
without mercy, cutting off all the branches and leaving
only four, which form a cross, and seem to point to
the cardinal points of the compass. Over the neck
of one of these he passes a slender cord, the ends of
which reach to the ground, and between two of the
remaining leaves he cuts deep into the poor wounded
tree. The laqby cask is next broached. A small
jar with a wide mouth is hoisted by means of the
cord and is fixed to the mouth of the incision that has
been made. Twelve hours afterward it can be taken

76 TEE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

down and replaced by another. It is full of a pale
gray liquid, resembling weak barley-water. This is
fresh laqby, a juice almost sickening from its exces-
sive sweetness, but useful as a pleasant, weak laxative
to be taken in the morning. A few hours later fer-
mentation begins in the vessel, the liquid clears up
and seems to boil ; innumerable bubbles of air rise to
the surface, forming a light foam, and if you taste the
sparkling beverage now, you will not sigh for the vint-
age of champagne. Laqby, drunk in this condition,
is harmless, cheering, without intoxication, and pro-
ducing no evil effects ; the fermentation renders it re-
freshing and takes away its laxative properties. But
let it stand another half day and this liquor will be-
come white and thick like milk, with a penetrating
odor, and a slightly acrid taste, and in this state it in-
toxicates like brandy. The champagne has become a
white beer of astonishing alcoholic strength. It is
then that amateurs love it best. Many a good Mussul-
man and his scrupulous wife (who veils her face before
a glass of wine), will drink in public, and without hes-
itation, a cup of laqby, which is only the " water of
the palm."

When it has reached this stage the vessel must be
emptied, for on the morrow the beverage would be
found spoiled and full of small reddish insects. In fact
it is the most perishable of all drinks, and has to be con-
sumed under the very tree from which it is drawn.
All attempts to regulate or arrest the fermentation
have been fruitless. It preaches, like no other preach-
er, the poets' doctrine, carpe diem. In Tripoli

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 77

(northern Africa), the Arabs drink their laqby daily,
as they smoke their pipe contemplatively on the bank
of a water-course.

AKECA PALM.

By the side of the champagne palm we must
mention the slim areca palm, so highly esteemed
by the Indians for its leaves and its fruits. In spite
of its height, which often reaches 40 feet, the stem is
exceedingly slender, and it is only by means of its
deep roots that it can withstand the fierce winds
of the tropics. Like all the trees of this class, the
areca palm also is crowned writh a magnificent plume
of gigantic feathery leaves, some of which measure 15
feet in length ; if cut before they leave the massive
bud in which they -are at first carefully enclosed, they
furnish the. famous palm cabbage, a great favorite
with Indians and Europeans alike.

A plantation of arecas is continually producing
fruit, and often on the same tree three stages of ripe-
ness may be observed in as many clusters of fruit.
These fruits, when about the size of an egg, grow in
groups, and assume, as they ripen, the color of an
orange. They are sometimes gathered before being
ripe, for the sake of their pulp, called pinang, which
is then of an agreeable taste. But generally the grow-
ers wait till the usual six months bring perfect matu-
rity, because thepinang is changed into a seed of the
size of a nutmeg ; this nut is one of the three ingre-
dients which make up the famous betel, so extensively
chewed by the Indians, and which gives to their teeth

78 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

a peculiar reddish black color, extremely repulsive to
foreigners.

The betel is composed of small pieces of arecanut
rolled up with a little fresh lime in the leaves of the
betel pepper.

We are puzzled to know how these ingredients can
be agreeable to the taste, yet it is certain that the prac-
tice of using the betel nut is of ancient origin among
the East Indians, and at least as general there as the
use of tobacco in Europe and America. Women even
habitually use it ; and the practice dates from such a
remote time that there is no tradition among them
that the teeth were ever allowed to retain their nat-
ural color. On the contrary, white teeth have ever
been looked upon as extremely ugly, resembling
dogs' teeth ! All the effects of the betel nut are not,
however, prejudicial. It strengthens the stomach and
makes the breath very agreeable. But it destroys the
enamel of the teeth and the teeth themselves — the
lime having, probably, most to do with this efiect.

The Indian betel must not be confounded with
that used by the Turkish women ; the latter has the
advantage of the former in usefulness, and is said
to possess none of its decided disadvantages.

The Indians always prepare their betel from the
newly-gathered areca nut and the betel pepper. The
color of betel is reddish, and gives the same color to
the saliva ; the latter has to be discarded till it loses
its redness — a very inconvenient necessity, which how-
ever, does not hinder the Indian women from using
it. The English often call the areca palm the betel-nut-

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 79

tree — but the name does not at all belong to the tree,
which is known to botanists only as the areca palm.

THE ELAIS PALM.

Among the precious plants that grow in the for-
ests of Africa, beyond Cape Verde, there is a palm, the
leaves of which are spread out at the height of thirty
feet from the ground, and which the natives call their
Friend. Even those who have visited the splendid
forests of the Tropics are struck with the beauty of
this magnificent tree, the Eldis Guineensis, which
clothes all the slopes inclined towards the sea, and
richly rewards the care bestowed upon it by the na-
tives. And yet its beauty is by no means superior to
its usefulness, as the exports from Liverpool to New
York attest. And yet so far, of its many products,
oil only has been an object of extended commerce and
exportation. The natives, on the contrary, not only
draw wine and oil from the noble tree, but they man-
ufacture from it their fishing-lines, hats, baskets, wood-
en tools, and even timber for their houses. It is their
companion and stay, charged by nature to subserve all
their wants from day to day.

Formerly the manufacture of this palm oil was
left entirely to the natives ; but now it is carried on by
foreigners in large farms among the forests of the
coast. When the seeds are ripe they are gathered,
cast into troughs and trampled under foot by negroes,
who are provided with w^ooden sandals.

Palm oil is one of the most important products of
the African coast. The elais does not grow under

80 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

the same conditions as the sesamum which produces
the gurgelly oil of commerce, for it is exclusively
found in the tropical regions of Africa. It grows in
large clusters in sheltered and fertile spots, and its
magnificent appearance recalls that of the date palm
of the Arabs. The oil is generally exported in its
crude state and refined abroad, while at Marseilles it
is made to produce soap also, and candles.

THE BOURBON PALM.

Linnaeus gave to the palms the pompous title of the
Princes of the Vegetable World. It may be truly
said that they are the aristocracy of the world of
plants, and on account of their beauty and majestic
stature they are worthy of the name that he gave
them.

The bourbon palm, and especially the red lata-
nier, as it is called in Louisiana also, is one of the
most beautiful of the family of palms. It came origi-
nally from the Southern provinces of China, and is
spread over the whole of India. The flower is of a
superb red color. The leaves are used by the natives
to thatch their huts, and the fibres for the manufac-
ture of light hats, as comfortable as our Panama hats,
but very different in form and structure. This tree
only flowers twice in a century.

The frontispiece of Hindoo manuscripts very fre-
quently consists of a drawing representing the esteem
in which palms are held in India : A man is seen
reading, reposing under the shade of one of these
trees. In fact, India is indebted to the palms not only

BOURBON PALM.

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 83

for the food of her children, but also for nearly all that
is necessary for life. Three palms especially are of
great service : the sago palm, the cocoa, and the
date. The sago palm, when in bloom, gives to man
a perfectly amazing amount of a farinaceous product.
The cocoa, on the other hand, ministers quite alone
to all his wants. Food, bread and wine, clothing,
shelter, articles of daily use, all are provided by the
cocoa. Nor is the date palm less valuable. We
know what a wonderful source of food it is to the Af-
ricans. These three palms deserve the same consider-
ation from the inhabitants of their respective coun-
tries which we give to wheat and the vine, and the
natives are not ungrateful. In more than one ancient
religion we find that these trees were the objects of
adoration on the part of grateful nations.

The traveller in Palestine or Syria contemplates
with a different interest the palms of the Holy Land.
The date is the commonest tree in these regions.
" Everywhere," says a recent traveller, " we see its
round stipe balancing high in the air its ample clus-
ters of fruit, and still higher above them its magnifi-
cent plume of leaves. Nothing is more beautiful than
an avenue of these noble trees ; and one can conceive
the enthusiasm with which the prophets of the Bible
and the poets of the East have celebrated it in their
songs.

THE WAX PALM.

"We cannot leave the chapter on palms without
mentioning one which yields wax, the carnahuba

84 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

(Corypha conifera), to which Humboldt gave the
name of the Tree of Life. It is one of these trees,
says M. Denis in his work upon Brazil, which
provide for all the wants of a village in the midst
of a desert. Owing to the hardness of its wood
and the manner in which its foliage is arranged, a
commodious cabin can be constructed by the aid of
two or three carnahuba, without employing any other
material than a little mud to plaster the walls. The
leaves are used in the manufacture of countless arti-
cles, mats, hats, ladders, baskets, and, in addition to all,
serve as food for cattle. In times of great drought
even the pith of the young wood can be given to
cattle and they subsist upon it till better fodder can
be had. Arrived at its full growth a nutritious starch
is obtained from the tree, the far-famed farina of our
day. Its fruit is pleasant, and would suit everybody,
at least as long as it is not fully ripe. But the main
production of the carnahuba, which gives it a special
place in vegetable economy, is the wax which appears
in the axes of the young leaves in the shape of a glu-
tinous powder or larger fragments of irregular shape.
This powder, obtained by the use of fire, assumes
gradually the consistency and odor of wax. Small ta-
pers are made of it in the countries where it is grown,
and large quantities exported to Europe, to be mixed
with tallow and manufactured into candles. This tree
furnishes, moreover, beautifully mottled or clouded
canes, which take a high polish and are eagerly sought
after in commerce. Another wax palm (Ceroxylon an-
dicola\ growing on the highest table-lands of the Andes

PALMS OF THE SEYCHELLES.

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 87

and frequently reaching a height of 215 feet, changes its
whole outer bark into wax, which the Indians scrape
off, purify and change into candles or use as soap.
It is in Havana that we admire to greatest advantage
the beautiful family of palms. Palm avenues are often
seen in the Island of Cuba planted in front of the
white mansions that overlook the sugar-cane fields.
Here are long avenues of palms, there of mangoes and
orange-trees, and at the other end lie the gardens and
vast plantations, where the negroes, men women and
children, renew each day their labors.

In Cuba the air is not excessively hot, and yet per-
fectly transparent. Light clouds, says Mr. Dana, are
floating at mid-height in the serene sky, the sun is
brilliant> and the luxuriant flora of a perpetual summer
covers the whole country. Everywhere rise these
wondrous palms. Many of the other trees resemble
ours,but these form the distinctive features of tropical
climates. The royal palm, especially, is characteristic
of the tropics — it cannot grow outside the narrow belt
which encircles our globe, lying close to the Equator.
It has no special beauty of its own, it gives no shade
and bears no fruit that is useful to man, and yet, with
all these disadvantages and drawbacks, it has the pow-
er to attract us irresistibly, and once seen it is never
again forgotten.

Palm-trees are however not unknown in the United
States ; in Key West, for instance, cocoa-nut palms
are seen overshadowing every thing, and presenting, in
the young trees especially, such grace of form as veg-
etation shows nowhere else. Date palms also, bear-

88 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

ing the dates of commerce, are quite numerous in Flor-
ida; and at Cape Sable there are groups of royal
palms of matchless beauty, perhaps, the first on earth
through whose leaves the wires of the telegraph flashed
their mysterious messages. Plants which furnish -wax
are found even in the United States. Such is, for in-
stance, the Myrica cerifera of Louisiana, rising at times
to a height of twelve feet, which was the first of its kind
known in Europe, where the seed was imported and
raised in hot-houses. A variety is found in the Middle
States, Myrica, Pennsylvania, Carolinensis, which does
not grow above five feet high ; the leaves are broader
and stouter and the fruit is larger. Marshes and damp
and sandy spots on the sea-shore are its favorite homes.
A very fertile bush furnishes about seven pounds of
berries, which produce nearly two pounds of wax.
The latter is removed from the seeds by means of
boiling water, in which the berries are violently shaken
and bruised. Candles made from this vegetable wax
perfume the room ; they give a bright and clear light,
especially if, as is usually the case here, a little tallow
is added during the process. This wax myrtle, or can-
dle-berry myrtle, enlivens the landscape by the bright-
ness of its foliage, which is evergreen ; it perfumes
and purifies, by its balsamic exhalations, the insalu-
brious air of the marshes in the midst of which it
flourishes.

We will close our remarks on palms by mention-
ing those of the Islands of the Seychelles, of which
Pyrard de Laval, in his narrative of a voyage to the
Maldives, says : " On the sea-coast is found a certain

ARBORESCENT FERNS.

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 01

nut, which the sea sometimes throws up, as large as
a man's head and looking very much like two melons
joined together. They call it Tavarcarre, and be-
lieve it to be the fruit of some trees growing beneath
the sea. The Portuguese call it the cocoa of the
Maldives. It has remarkable medicinal properties,
and is very dear. So precious was it, that when a
native wished to injure a neighbor, he accused him
of having found one of these nuts and concealed it
from the king, to whom it should be given up ; and
when one became suddenly rich it was commonly
said that he had either found Tavarcarre or amber, as
if it were a priceless treasure."

The fruit of this palm was long known as nux
niedica. The tree itself bears the name of Lodoicea.
I ts huge fruit is often carried on the waves to consid-
erable distances, and hence arose the idea that the nuts
were produced by submarine trees.

The realm of palm-trees is not without its mocking
imitations, in which nature occasionally seems to de-
light. A variety of ferns, called arborescent ferns,
and especially numerous in New Zealand, closely im-
itates the form and shape of palm-trees, and gives to
those distant landscapes an appearance utterly unlike
that of any other part of the world.

The Bamboo.

CHAPTER Y.

BANANA, BAMBOO, BAOBAB.

npHESE are perhaps the three strongest workmen
^- employed in the vegetable world — they have
withstood centuries, and no living thing rivals them
in power.

Certain writers have tried to prove that the ba-
nana was the tree of life placed in the middle of par-
adise, the forbidden fruit, which, tempting the mother
of the human race, " caused all our woes ;" and besides,
that it was of its leaves that Adam and Eve made
themselves aprons when, after their sin, they dreaded
to meet their Creator.

The inhabitants of America, Africa, and India,

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 93

and the natives of the Pacific islands fully appreciate
the immense value of this plant, which sustains a
large part of the races inhabiting tropical regions.

"We have the banana, in Florida at least, as a plant
of our own also. Here, as everywhere, it is not a
tree, but annual in its growth, although the root is
perennial. In one year the banana grows from the
root to about twelve feet high, bears its one bunch of
fruit and dies. Other shoots are however coming up
in the mean time from the root ; they in turn bear
their fruit, each after a year's growth, and this meth-
od of growing brings the plant into extensive and
beautiful groups. Every yard in Key West has its
banana patch, and the grand glossy leaves lend great
beauty to the humble cottage as well as to the impos-
ing mansion.,

For the plant sends up a single round and straight
stem of a yellowish green color, which terminates in
a fanlike expanse of large oval leaves, six feet long
and from eighteen to twenty inches in breadth. A
great strong midrib traverses the leaf, but the latter
is so tender that it is almost invariably torn into
shreds by the winds. The flower bud is purple, con-
trasting iinely with the green of the leaves. It ex-
pands into a noble spike of flowers about four feet
high, rising from the centre of the leaves eight or
nine months after the planting of the vegetable.
The flowers are soon followed by the fruit, which is
eight inches long by one in diameter. These long
spikes of fruit sometimes weigh 70 pounds, .and look
like a gigantic cluster of grapes formed of a large

94 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

number of fruits which frequently count as many as
150 or 160. When the tree is stripped of its fruits
the stem also is cut down, which prevents the plant
from drying up and causes the suckers at its base to
grow up more rapidly, providing thus for another
harvest six months afterward. The growing plant is
aided from time to time by cultivating the soil around
it, but this is all, and hence banana plantations usually
placed near rivers are easily kept up with very little
care. The dressing of bananas for the table is equally
simple, as the fruit is cooked either in boiling water,
on the oven or among hot ashes. The fibres of the
stem are used to manufacture coarse shirts, and the
green part is given as food to cattle. The inhabi-
tants of the Moluccas subject the leaves to a certain
process which enables them to convert them into a
kind of linen.

Weight for weight the banana is inferior to wheat
as nutritive food, but much more is produced on the
same extent of ground. An acre of land planted in
wheat would not yield sufficient to support two per-
sons, whereas the same amount of land in the tropics,
planted in bananas, would produce food enough for
the support of fifty people ! It has been calculated
that a strip of land of two hundred square acres is
capable of furnishing more than four thousand
pounds of nutritive substance ; from which it follows
that the produce of this vegetable is to that of wheat
sown upon an equal breadth of ground as 133 to 1,
and to that of potatoes as 44 to 1.

In the abundant productions of the tropics we find

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 95

a striking comment upon human nature and the con-
dition of its development. It proves that the progress
of man is measured by the urgency and the contin-
gencies of his necessities. The banana-tree feeds the
inhabitants of the regions in which it grows without
demanding labor — daily food is within their reach,
sufficing for all their bodily wants without the neces-
sity on their part of active exertions ; consequently,
they remain in a condition of comparative mental
somnolence, and we find the character of their inert
lives clearly written in their listless faces.

In Java there are bananas the appearance of which
produces a deep and permanent impression upon the
mind. M. de Molins thus describes his feelings upon
arriving in the forests of that island : —

" After a journey of an hour and a half through
the open country we found ourselves in the jungle.
It was a confused mass of vegetation, in which, how-
ever, the wild banana, with its leaves a pale green on
one side, and on the other spotted with red and brown,
seemed to be the most prevalent tree. We steered
our way through this sea of plants of all kinds, and
admired in it above all the tree-ferns with their arbor-
escent stems, and graceful and regular leaves — those
marvellous ferns which vie equally with the flowers
by their exquisite form, with the birds by their beau-
tiful color, and with the trees by their imposing
height.

" All at once the native who went with us as
guide, and who was aware of the object of our expedi-
tion, stopped and called us : ' Look here ! ' * Where ? :

96 THE WONDERS OF YE(lETATIOS.

I asked. 'There,' lie said, Ms the first of the giant
trees, sir, the one you saw from town, sir.'

He pointed out to me a kind of tower adorned at
the summit with brandies and flowers, a structure
such as no foreigner surely would ever have taken for
a tree.

a This is only a small one," said the guide, " but
in going higher up, you will find trees of larger
growth."

In fact, although the specimen before our eyes
seemed to be almost supernatural in its size, we saw
as we came to the borders of the immense forest, that
as we proceeded the trees became larger and larger
still. One remarkable circumstance was that they
were almost all diseased ; many of them were black
at the top and stretched far into the air their huge,
leafless arms. I was told that the sun was the cause
of this, and that these vigorous trees could not endure
the fierceness of its rays.

I am not able, now that I have no longer these
giants of the forest before my eyes — to express the
sense of awe excited in me by the sight of these
colossi, veritable patriarchs of the forest, many of
which, no doubt, had witnessed the earliest creations
of nature, and belonged to epochs when the earth was
still in its first vigorous youth, while now they sur-
rounded me with their gigantic trunks and shaded
me with the foliage of their enormous branches.

Humboldt- represents the bananas as everywhere
found in company with palms. These trees, he says,
are the ornaments of moist climates. Their fruits

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 97

furnish the food of almost all the races that live in
the Torrid Zone. As the farinaceous cereals have been
an unfailing resource to the inhabitants of the North,
the banana has never disappointed the nations that
dwell near the equator. According to Semitic tradi-
tions, this productive plant was first found upon the
banks of the Euphrates ; according to others it first
grew in India, on the skirts of the Himalaya. Greek
legends state that cereals first grew on the fields of
Enna, in Sicily. But the fruits of Ceres, extended by
cultivation to all the northern countries, present only
monotonous fields, which add little to the picturesque
charm of the landscape, while, on the other hand, the
inhabitant of the tropics, who multiplies his banana-
plantations, propagates one of the most beautiful and
majestic forms of the vegetable kingdom.

BAMBOOS.

There is no tree known on earth which subserves
so many purposes as the bamboo. The Indian ob-
tains from it part of his food, many of his household
utensils, and a wood at once lighter and capable of
bearing greater strains than heavier timber of ' the
same size. Besides, in expeditions in the tropics under
the rays of a vertical sun, bamboo trunks have more
than once been used as barrels, in which a water,
much purer than could be preserved in vessels of any
other kind, is kept fresh for the crew. Upon the
west coast of South America, and in the large islands
of Asia, bamboos furnish all the materials for the con-
struction of houses at once pleasant, substantial, and

98 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

preferable to those of stone, which the frequently re-
curring earthquakes bring down upon the heads of the
lodgers.

An illustration of bamboos as they appear in the
tropics, heads the present chapter.

Leaving the immense size of these plants out of
consideration, we would at the first glance relegate
them either to the class of grasses or of reeds — their
appearance seeming to indicate that they belong to
former class, while the structure of the long hollow
stem, with its joints and sharp-pointed leaves, presents
all the characteristics of the latter. Botanists, how-
ever, have at last decided that bamboos are a tribe of
grasses.

But the name cannot alter the thing itself, and it
is not our purpose here to discuss the somewhat arbi-
trary classification of botanists. We prefer to con-
sider these plants simply as we find them, and to note
their distinctive characteristics without troubling our-
selves about the Greek or Latin names which they
are made to bear.

These plants are found only in the Torrid Zone —
for the reason either that the heat of the tropics is
necessary to their development or that their cultiva-
tion has never yet been attempted in temperate cli-
mates under favorable circumstances. Of the 170
species discovered by modern travellers, five or six are
specially prominent.

The loftiest of the bamboos is the Sammot. In
the tracts where it grows in the greatest perfection it
sometimes rises to the height of 100 feet, with a stern

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 99

only 18 inches in diameter at the base. The wood
itself is not more than an inch in thickness. The fact
that the bamboo is hollow has made it eminently use-
ful for a variety of purposes — it serves as a measure
for liquids, and if fitted with a lid and a bottom,
trunks and barrels are made of it. Small boats even
are made of the largest trunks by strengthening them
with strips of other wood where needed.

After the sammot, the next largest of the bamboo
species is the Illy, which usually reaches a height
of from 60 to 70 feet. It is used for the same pur-
poses as the Sammot) and, like it, prefers a moist, rich
soil.

The third variety prevails throughout Southern
Asia, both on the continent and in the larger islands.
It rises to the height of 50 feet. It is employed for
the same purposes to which the other two varieties
are applied, but is much more useful than either of
these. For example, the young sprouts, of the stem
and of the root, of the Telin — for such is the name
given to this bamboo — are excellent food and are
eaten as we eat asparagus, either prepared with vine-
gar and sauces or with other viands. European colo-
nists are as fond of these shoots as the natives them-
selves. The wood of the Telin unites strength and
lightness in a much more extraordinary degree than
any other wood, and cut into thin planks or split into
laths it is admirably suited for house-building in the
tropics.

A still smaller species of the bamboo, which is
not applied to so many purposes in domestic economy,

100 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

industry and agriculture, is the Ampel, which, how-
ever, furnishes levers, carts, ladders, and many similar
objects. The Indians, when employed upon lofty
palm-trees collecting the palm- wine at a height of a 100
feet above the ground, are not afraid of going from
one tree to another means of a simple bridge made
of ampel-wood. The airy bridge consists of a single
long stem of this tree and another lighter one serves
as a hand rail. The young shoots, like those of the
telin, are used for food. It is in this class of plants that
we meet with the iron- wood — as it is called in India
— which gives out sparks under the blows of a hatchet.
Its hardness is unequalled, and yet it can be split up
into the finest wands and in this form is much more
suitable for delicate basket-work than the osier. Even
cloth of a certain kind is made from this bamboo.

We have still to mention the Tcho of the Chinese,
which furnishes them- a solid paper, and is used in
manufacturing their large parasols. Painters often
use it as canvas. There is also the Teba, from which
hedges are made and the Arundo scriptoria of Lin-
naeus, so called, because the Indian authors obtain their
pens from it.

These latter species prefer a dry, light soil, and
are equally acclimatized. The sweet interior of their
young branches is a nourishing food, made use of by
man and also by herbivorous animals. There is a
correspondence between the course of the moon and
the vegetation of these plants from which has arisen
the superstition that this satellite regulates their growth
by its influence, a superstition confined by no means

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 101

to the Chinese, but quite common also among our
negroes. The young shoots, which grow in bunches
at the roots of the bamboos — the product of the under-
ground germ — grow with such amazing rapidity that
they may be literally said to be seen growing. In
one day they obtain the height of several feet,
and with the microscope,. their development can be
easily watched. But the most remarkable feature
about the bamboo is their blossoming. With all this
marvellous rapidity of growth they bloom only twice
in a century, the flower appearing at the end of fifty
years. Like other grasses, they die after having borne
seed.

THE BAOBAB.

This plant of monstrous size, the most colossal and
the most ancient vegetable monument on earth, has
round, woolly leaves, which consist of from three to
seven leaflets radiating from a common centre and
giving them somewhat the appearance of a hand; and
magnificent white flowers. It is an enormous tree,
holding among plants the place that the elephant
holds among animals — a hoary witness of the last
changes which the earth has undergone and of del-
uges that have buried beneath their waves the pro-
ductions of early ages. Several baobabs that have
been measured were found to be from 70 to 77 feet
in circumference. From its branches hang at times
colossal nests, three feet in length, and resembling
large oval baskets open at the bottom and looking
from a distance like so many signal flags. The birds

102 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

that build them are nearly the size of ostriches and
thus correspond well with the giant tree that affords
them shelter. The height of the baobab is, however,
not in proportion to its circumference, as may be seen
by oui* illustration.

It would take fifteen men with their arms extend-
ed to embrace the trunk of one of these great trees,
which, in the countries through which the Senegal
flows, are venerated as sacred monuments. Enor-
mous branches are given off from the central stem a
few feet above the ground and spread out horizon-
tally, giving the tree a diameter of over 100 feet.
" Each of these branches," says M. Danton, " would be
a monstrous tree elsewhere ; and, taken together, they
seem to make up a forest rather than a tree."

It is only at the age of 800 years that the baobabs
attain their full size and then cease to grow.

The fruit of this tree is oblong ; the color of the
shell passes in ripening from green to yellow and
brown. The fruit has been named "monkey bread."
It contains a spongy substance, paler than chocolate
and filled with abundant juice.

The bark is ashy-gray in color, and almost an inch
in thickness. The negroes of the Senegal grind it
down to powder, and in this state they use it to season
their food and to maintain a moderately free perspi-
ration, which enables them the more easily to with-
stand the excessive heat. It serves also as an anti-
dote for certain fevers.

In Abyssinia bees choose baobab-trees for their
hives, and their honey derives from the tree a perfume

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 105

and a taste which make it to be much sought after
by the natives. Like the bees, poets and musicians
also are entombed by many African tribes in the
trunks of baobabs. In the eyes of Africans, how-
ever, these are not tombs of honor ; and the reason
why they give their poets and musicians this strange
place of sepulchre is the belief that their gifted
brethren are in communication with spirits. They
have a superstitious horror of their remains, and will
not bury them in the earth that brings forth their
food, nor in the channels of rivers. It is difficult to
form an idea of the space which these trunks enclose ;
some of them could hold 240 men, Besides using
them as places of sepulchre, the natives employ them
for other purposes; they sometimes encamp within
them, and at other times use them as stables.

Adanson has calculated the age of these trees by
the depth of certain notches made upon them by
sailors of the fifteenth century, who cut their names
in the bark in letters of considerable size ; he exam-
ined the new layers of wood which had covered
these notches, and compared their thickness with that
of trunks of the same kind, the age of which was
known. " He has found," says Humboldt, " for a diam-
eter of .about 30 feet, an age of 5,150 years." He has,
however, had the prudence to add these words:
" The calculation of the age of each layer cannot be re-
garded as mathematically exact." In the village of
Grand Galarques, situated also in Senegambia,the ne-
groes have ornamented the hollow of a baobab with
carvings cut in the wood. The interior space serves

106 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

as an assembly hall, where the affairs of the tribe are
discussed. This hall recalls the "cavern" (specns)
formed in the hollows of a palm-tree in Lycia, in which a
consular personage, Licinius Mucianus, used to enter-
tain nineteen friends at dinner. Pliny describes anoth-
er cavity of the same kind as being eighty Roman feet
in width.

The calculations of Adanson and of Perrottet,
from which it would appear that there are baobabs in
the world from 5,000 to 6,000 years old, would make
these plants the contemporaries of the builders of the
pyramids, or even of earlier mythical personages.

These immense trunks are crowned with a vast
number of large, almost horizontal branches, and on
this account they appear, when seen from a distance,
like gigantic parasols ; as the lower branches nearly
reach down to the ground, they give to the whole form
of the tree the appearance of a perfect hemisphere 100
feet in height and 250 feet in circumference.

The great dryness and intense heat of the tropical
climate produce upon these trees the same effect
which cold has upon northern plants ; they lose their
leaves, and only resume their foliage during the rainy
season, which lasts from December to June.

Besides the uses which the negroes of Senegambia
make of the fruit of the baobab, they are also careful
to dry the leaves, which appear at this season, and to
reduce them to powder, to which, as has been stated,
they ascribe medicinal properties. It cures dysentery
2 nd the inflammatory fevers to which Europeans liv-
>ng in Senegal are frequently exposed.

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 107

The baobab surpasses all known trees in size, and
even forms an exception to the general rule in vege-
tation in Australia. It is hardly ever found beyond
a hundred miles from the coast, and it occurs most
frequently on the river Glenelg as far as the western
borders of Arnheim's Land. It prefers level sandy
tracts ; in stony and less fertile soil it rises to no
great height, but still attains a colossal breadth, throw-
ing out branches of extraordinary thickness. The
fruit of the Australian baobab is much smaller than
that of the African variety, in which an important
trade is carried on in Senegal. But the fruit of the
former is as highly prized by the Australians as the
latter by the negroes of Senegambia. The tart pulp
of this fruit is called by the German settlers on the Or-
ange River, Cream of Tartar, and by the English col-
onists Monkey bread. The baobab of Australia is
not considered as a curiosity only, but as a tree bear-
ing a sort of providential food, which is obtained at
once in a solid and liquid form, and a most abundant
ministrant to human wants in that arid and burning
climate.

The Cedars on Atlas Moimtuiua.

CHAPTER VI.

CEDARS OF LEBANON AND OF AFEICA.

traveller who ascends the ancient mountains of
Lebanon is overcome with awe when, having ar-
rived at the lofty plateaux that crown them, he sees
that the heavens are still shut out from his gaze by
the green veil stretched above his head by the broad
branches of the cedars. Calm and silent witnesses of
revolutions that have altered the face of the world,
they have beheld unmoved the terrors of man in the
fearful days when the waters covered the earth. The
strong men of the early ages of the world reposed un-
der their shade, tribes set up their tents there, and patri-
archal families rested there in their wanderings. As we

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 109

approach them, we feel as if we were unworthy to
touch them, so great in comparison with our little
lives are the associations that crowd around these ven-
erable giants.

" These trees are the most celebrated natural mon-
uments in the world," says Lamartine, who visited
them in 1833. " They have been alike consecrated by
religion, poetry and history. The Scriptures celebrate
them in many a passage, and they supplied the im-
ages which the poets delighted to use. Solomon wished
to employ them in the building of the Temple, no
doubt because of the magnificence and the sacred
character of these trees even at this early epoch." The
Arabs of all sects have a traditional veneration for
these trees. They attribute to them not only a vege-
tative force, which enables them to live forever, but
also a soul which imparts to them the power to man-
ifest signs of consciousness and an understanding sim-
ilar to the instinct of animals and the intelligence of
man. They have a premonition of the seasons ; they
move their huge branches like limbs — stretch them
out and draw them in, raise them toward heaven or
bend them toward the earth. In the Arab mind they
are divine beings in the form of trees. They grow
nowhere else but on the table-lands of the Lebanon,
taking root high above the region where all other
great plants cease to thrive.

The number of these trees diminishes in each suc-
ceeding age. In 1550, Bellon counted thirty of them ;
in 1600, there were only twenty-four ; in 1650, twen-
ty-two ; in 1700, sixteen ; in 1800, seven. These sev-

HO THE WONDERS OF V !•:<! STATION.

en giant trees are, perhaps, the only living witnesses
to-day of Biblical times.

Mount Lebanon separates the Holy Land from
Syria, above whose loftiest mountains it towers. The
range has the form of a horse-shoe, and measures not
less than three thousand miles in length. To the
south is Palestine, to the north Armenia, to the east
Arabia, to the west the Syrian Sea. From Tripoli to
Damascus, the slopes of the Lebanon are not far from
the sea ; at certain points they even touch the shore.
The eastern part is known among the Greeks as the
Anti-Lebanon.

The mountains rise the one above the other and pre-
sent four diiferent zones. According to travellers, the
soil of the first zone produces grain crops and is rich
in fruit-trees. The second zone is simply a belt of
naked and sterile rocks. The third, in spite of its
elevation, is covered with evergreens ; and the softness
of its temperature, its gardens, its orchards, filled with
the finest fruit in all Syria, and the brooks which
water it, make this a kind of earthly paradise. The
fourth zone is in the clouds ; and the perpetual snow,
with which it is covered, has given the name of Leban
(white) to these mountains. It is on one of the sum-
mits of this fourth zone that are still to be seen the
cedars of Scripture.

" What prayers have ascended from beneath these
branches !" exclaims the poet ; " and where is there on
earth a more beautiful temple than this one, so near
to heaven itself? What dais more majestic and more
beautiful than this last plateau of the Lebanon !

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. HI

What more productive of elevated thoughts than the
cedar, the dome of which has sheltered and still shel-
ters so many human generations, each one of which
calls upon the name of God in a different tongue ; but
recognizes Him alike in all His works, and worships
Him in the manifestation of his greatness in nature ! "

The trees rise to the height of from sixty to one
hundred feet. The largest of those that remain is
thirteen feet in diameter and covers a circumference
of one hundred and twenty feet. The branches, of a
clear green even during the part of the year when
they are covered with snow, are flat, horizontal, and
covered with a close foliage. For a long time the ce-
dar was classed as belonging to the larch family, but
it is now regarded as a group of the Pinus family.

The fruit, as large as that of the pine, is round-
er, more compact and smoother.

In his narrative of his journey to the Eastern Sa-
hara, Mr. Martins speaks with the greatest admiration
of the superb cedars of that part of the world. " The
most beautiful forests of cedars," he says, " ornament
the crests and the gorges of Chellalah, near Batna ; few
are seen in Djurjura and at Teniet-el-Had, south
of Miliana. What a contrast between these beautiful
forests and the sterile tracts that lead to where they
grow ! When young, the cedars of the Atlas are pyr-
amidal in form ; but, when they have grown taller
than their neighbors or the rock which shelters them,
a tempest, a thunderbolt, or an insect that pierces the
terminal sprouts deprive them of their pointed tops.
The branches spread sideways, and form a perfect

112 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

wilderness of verdure, concealing the sky from the
eyes of the traveller, who passes on in darkness under
these vaults impenetrable to the rays of the sun. From
the height of a lofty mountain-top the sight is still
more imposing. The level surfaces of the trees then
look like a broad dark green, or almost blue meadow,
sown with egg-shaped purple cones. The eye is lost
in an abyss of green, at the bottom of which an invis-
ible torrent brawls along. Often an isolated group
attracts the attention ; as we draw near, expecting to
see a number of trees, we are astonished to iind that
we stand before a single tree, cut down in times of
yore by the Romans or the first Arab conquerors.
The tree has sent up new shoots, enormous branches
have grown from the old stock, and each is a tree of
full-grown size, while vast fans of verdure spread out
on all sides from the mutilated trunk and cast their
shadows far across the earth. Some of these cedars
are still standing, though dead ; the bark has fallen off,
and they stretch their bleached bare arms in all direc-
tions. The cedars of Africa still await their painter.
A Marilhat has worthily painted the cedars of Lebanon ;
but his successors are content to paint over and over
again the portraits X)f a few oaks of home forests, which
the connoisseurs recognize as old friends in every ex-
hibition. Eminent artists spend their lives in repro-
ducing the same forms, while the venerable cedars
live and die unknown in the gorges of the Atlas,
where their beauty is admired only by the occasional
traveller that ventures into these mountains."

The Cactus— the Giant Taper.

CHAPTEE YII.

'THE SCREW-PINES.

astonishing diversity of the productions of na-
ture in different climates is so great, that even ex-
perienced travellers cannot restrain an exclamation of
wonder, when they pass from one part of the world to
another, and even from one side to the other of the
same continent. This is especially the case with ex-
plorers of Senegal, when they have just crossed the
desolate wastes of the Sahara. The richest vegetation
suddenly succeeds to the most complete sterility, and
tall, black Africans are met with in place of the
stunted Arabs. The trees preserve a never failing
freshness — growing young again each season before

114 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

they have time to assume an aged look. They are
seen inclining toward the waves of the ocean, as if
they desired to drink the tepid and saline waters.

The strange plant which we present in the accom-
panying illustration, belongs to the family of screw-
pines (Pandanaceae), of which Senegambia is the fa-
vorite country, but which is also found in Polynesia, in
New Zealand, and in Guinea. M. de Folin, who has
drawn it from nature, gives the following details re-
specting it, as he observed it in Prince's Island, thirty
hours' sail from the Guinea coast and 1° 30 ]S". Lat :

" A stream that falls from the steep cliffs of the isl-
and, dashing its silvery waves from rock to rock,
keeps up a constant moisture in a narrow valley,
where the heat of the rays of the sun that beat all day
upon the cliffs on each side, is reflected and concen-
trated. The warm moist atmosphere, due to these
causes, maintains a most vigorous vegetation at the
foot of the valley. The screw-pine grows at a spot
where the gorge widens, and the torrent, spreading
out into a limpid lake, pauses for a moment before
flowing forth to fall into the sea.

This strange tree, with its slender supports, its bare
branches, gracefully inclining toward the horizon,
and spreading out its enormous fans and diadems
of beautiful leaves, has the most airy appearance.

Masses of young shoots and of aquatic plants are
grouped around each trunk and reflected in the water
that furnishes the screw-pine its home and its sup-
port.

The weirdness of the strange scene is heightened

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

by the solitude that reigns all around in perfect si-
lence ; only now and then some aquatic animal utters
a low cry as it throws itself upon the shore, or a lonely
heron, perched upon a half-submerged rock, exults as
he swoops down furiously upon his prey.

Among the screw-pines we must notice one spe-
cies much prized by the inhabitants of Oceanica, who
weave beautiful mats with its leaves. It is called
the sweet-scented Paiidanus (P. odoratissimus), from
the circumstance that its flowers exhale an odor at
once sweet and strong, which perfumes the whole
neighborhood. Another screw-pine, more extraor-
dinary still, if we are to believe De Candolle, has a
flower which in opening emits a flash of light accom-
panied by sound.

In Madagascar is found the Pandanus muricatus ;
but we look in vain in this island for the beautiful
trees which adorn the virgin forests of Sumatra, of
Borneo, or even America. Yet the useful screw-
pines overrun the low reaches of the coast. They
are of a singular form, full of grace, and yet mournful.
The trunk, covered with a smooth bark, divides at
the height of about six feet into three branches of equal
size. Each branch divided again into three others,
forms thus at the summit a crown of the finest foliage.
The entire height never exceeds thirty feet.

THE CACTUS. THE GIANT CANDLE.

In America, from the Mississippi to the shores of
the Pacific, in the state of Sonora, and in Southern
California, the traveller meets with the gigantic candle-

118 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

tree (Cereus giganteus), a plant which is at once sim
pie and singular in form, and is called " the giant can
die," because of its form and height. It is the queen of
the cactus tribe, and towers with its straight stem above
the short and twisted varieties that belong to the same

CD

family.

" In this country," says the traveller Mollhausen,
" animals and plants show to advantage, though the
same thing cannot be said o'f the human inhabitants.
The hideous Indians whom we met, dwelt near a de-
file called the Cactus Pass, because of the plants of
that name, that are found there in great numbers."
Among these the most remarkable is the Cereus gi-
ganteus. This king of the cacti is known in Cali-
fornia and in New Mexico as the Petahoya. The
missionaries who, more than a century ago reached the
Colorado and the Gila, speak of the fruit of the Peta-
hoya upon which the natives subsisted and with
which they were as much delighted as in later days
the trappers. This strange plant consists of nothing
but a few branches and still fewer leaves. Its north-
ern limit reaches to the banks of the Gila. Savage
deserts and the most sterile tracts seem to be the
localities most favored by this plant, which finds
means of pushing its roots between stones and rocks,
where not an atom of soil is to be seen and where it
grows, nevertheless, to a surprising height. The form
of these cacti varies with age. At first twice as large
at the top as at the root, the plant, in proportion as it ar-
rives at maturity, enlarges it diameter till it becomes
symmetrical and assumes the appearance of a straight

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 121

column for about twenty feet, to the place where the
branches are produced. Here round branches go
straight out from the trunk, but they gradually curve
upwards, parallel to the trunk, and rise to the same
height. It is at this stage that the curious plant, with
its many upright branches, looks like a gigantic, can-
delabrum, and deserves its name of giant candle.

At first sight one cannot conceive how these lofty
stems, isolated, and clinging only to a point of rock,
can withstand the tempest ; but they owe their se-
curity to a series of ribs placed in the interior of the
fleshy stem, from the top to the bottom, and which
are as hard as the wood of the cactus. Both trunk
and branches are regularly fluted throughout their
entire length, and from this circumstance they bear a
striking likeness to Corinthian columns. In May and
June, the time of bloom, the upper end of the
branches, and of the main stem, are covered with
large white flowers, which are replaced in the two fol-
lowing months by savory fruits. This plant is one
of the favorite articles of food used by the Indians,
who also convert it into a sort of syrup. Upon the
tree these oval and pear-shaped fruits grow close to-
gether; they are green, but at the top turn reddish.
The pulp is crimson, and tastes like that of the fresh
fig, but much drier. These cacti reach the height of
60 feet; when the plant dies, the flesh falls away,
piece by piece, from the fibres of the stem, and for
years afterwards holding on by the roots, these gigan-
tic and bare skeletons are seen still clinging to the
rock.

122 THE WONDERS OF VE&ETATION.

" It is to the New World," says Humboldt, " that
the cactus-form exclusively belongs; they appear
sometimes jointed, sometimes spherical, and some-
times like fluted columns, or organ tubes." This group
forms the most striking contrast with the lily-tribe
and the bananas. It belongs to that class of plants
which Saint Pierre named the "vegetable springs of
the desert." In the arid plains of South America,
the animals, tormented with thirst, dig under the sand
for the melo-cactus, the watery pith of which is pro-
tected by formidable thorns. The cacti, which take
the form of pillars, reach a height of 27 or 30 feet.
Divided into branches like candelabra, and often cov-
ered with lichens, they present an appearance like
that of some of the euphorbias of Africa. These
plants form vast oases in the midst of deserts bare of
all vegetation.

The flowers of the night-blooming cacti have ev-
erywhere been regarded as symbolical. The cereus
obtained its name from the torches with which Ceres
is said to have searched for Proserpine. The superb
cactus, which is called the torch-thistle in Mexico, is
called the steppe-light in Russia. Our own Indians,
and those of South America, seem to have observed the
phenomena of sleeping and night-blooming plants,
and it has been thought that they had to some extent
anticipated the famous floral clock of Linnaeus.

ASCLEPJAS GIG ANTE A.

In the aspect of its trees, Eastern Africa presents
to us forms not less strange than the names which

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 123

they bear. South of the Strait of Bab-el-Mandeb
(Strait of Tears), near the Gubet-el-Kherab (Basin of
Untruth), which is a small bay of that part of the
Arabian Gulf called Bahr-el-Bonatien (Sea of the Two
Sisters), there stands the little town of Tanjourra.
It is here, especially, that the Asdepias gigantea is
found growing ; a prickly acacia covered with a num-
ber of exuberant lianes. The small antelope, as well
as aquatic fowls and the water-hen, haunt the shady
woods formed by these beautiful trees ; and this calm
and enchanting scene would leave no unpleasant im-
pression on your mind, if Tanjourra were not the
centre of an abominable slave-trade.

THE CORK OAK.

"We will conclude this chapter with a useful plant
better known by its peculiar product than in itself.
The description of its bark will lead us to consider
the general structure of all trees.

A section of a full- grown tree presents three fun-
damental concentric subdivisions. First, the medul-
lary canal, containing the pith or medulla. Second,
the woody substance surrounding the pith. Third,
an outer envelope — the bark. In the bark itself there
are again three different substances placed in juxta-
position ; the liber, consisting of thin leaflets, the
parenchyme or cellular system, through which the sap
circulates, and the epidermis or outer skin. This is
the general structure of all trees. In the tree which
produces cork, the parenchyme or middle division of
the bark is the portion which furnishes that substance.

124: THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

It is only after the cork tree is fifteen years of age
that it has a parenchyma sufficiently developed to
serve for this purpose. From this time onward to
its last years we can strip the tree of its bark every
eight or ten years, and each barking will produce
90 or 110 pounds of cork. In Catalonia, the true
home of the cork-tree, or the cork oak as it is also
called, a sufficient quantity of cork is reaped every
year for the manufacture of 500,000,000 of corks,
which are put up in bales of 30,000 each.

The manner in which the cork is gathered is thus :
two incisions are made in the bark round the tree,
and then two perpendicular incisions, taking care not
to reach the liber — the innermost layer of the bark.
Through one of the horizontal cuts a thin sharp blade
is introduced and a square piece of the bark carefully
removed. Other incisions are made and other squares
of cork removed from the tree until it has been com-
pletely stripped. A liquid resembling melted wax
flows in between the liber and the parenchyma and
facilitates the operation. After being stripped, the
cork oak is soon covered again with a viscous matter
which escapes from tiny openings in the liber, and
which spreads over the surface, hardens, and forms
the basis of a new bark. But there must be an inter-
val of about ten years before the tree can be stripped
again.

This tree belongs specially to warm climates, and
Algeria possesses whole forests which are now being
worked by French colonists.

A savage shooting poisoned Arrows (p. 139).

OHAPTEE VIII.

MILKY SECRETIONS.

milk-trees which we have described in the
•*- first pages of this book, are not the only ones
which are remarkable for an abundance of milky sap.
Others also, serving purposes of another nature or
even of pernicious and fatal character, deserve to be
classed among the vegetables worthy of our attention.
The families of plants which are most remarkable for
their abundant sap are the Euphorbiacece, the Apo-
cynece and the Urticece — differing from each other
in their anatomical structure. They have in their
bark and sometimes in the pith of their sterns, a
number of long tubes, more or less inosculated and
flexible, which are so much like the veins of animals

126 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

that they ha-ve misled many a naturalist and justified
the comparison of vegetable sap with animal blood.
Yet it seems that the term of " vital fluid," as applied
to the latter, is inappropriate, and that of milky sap
is more justifiable.

Certain trees which contain milky sap in great
quantity have been called the serpents of the vegeta-
ble kingdom ; and the most striking feature of the re-
semblance is in the organ, by the help of which both
the plant and the animal emit poison. It is well known
that with many serpents the poison is held in two
long teeth of the upper jaw, which are traversed
throughout their whole length by a narrow canal.
At the root of these teeth is a gland that secretes the
poison, and can be compressed by the pressure of the
teeth like a sponge. At the moment when the ani-
mal bites, the poison is thrown into the medullary
canal of the tooth and through a small opening into
the wound. In poisonous plants we observe a simi-
lar arrangement in the bristles of the leaves — we can
easily see this by examining the leaves of a nettle.
The poison of the common nettle is as little danger-
ous as that of many snakes, but it becomes deadly as
we approach the equator, the heat of the tropical sun
seeming to intensify the venom both of the plant and
the snake.

The three great families which are distinguished
for the abundance and the value of their milky juices
resemble each other in the nature of that liquid ; and
hence we shall here mention only the most remarka-
ble species. Foremost among these stands a vegeta-

GUTTA-PERCHA TREE

TEE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 129

ble product the employment of which for various uses
has been wonderfully extended in our days — the In-
dia-rubber or caoutchouc.

This gum can be obtained from a great number
of trees ; those which produce it in greatest abundance
being Hevea-guy 'anensis, the SipJionia cahuchu and
the Jatropha elastica. In the Antilles it is extract-
ed from the purple Euphorbia and the elastic Urceale,
the product of which is esteemed by some superior to
that of the Hevea. In spite of this great number of
caoutchouc-plants one would almost fear that the im-
mense quantities of caoutchouc brought into all the
markets of the world, would soon transform the for-
ests in which they grow into wastes of dead trees, as
has happened in North Carolina, where the larches
and pines, which have been tapped for their turpen-
tine, covers vast territories with dead wood, looking
like forests of bare masts.

The infinitely multiplied uses to which caoutchouc
is applied in these days are truly remarkable. In
England and America it is used to an enormous ex-
tent. In 1820, 52,000 pounds were imported into
Great Britain; in 1833, 1T8,676 pounds; and at the
present day a much larger quantity is imported. The
United States consumes more than twice this quantity.

This increase is of course much more noticeable
since the invention of vulcanite or vulcanized caout-
chouc. The vulcanization is a chemical process, the
effect of which is to remove entirely the elasticity of
the material and to give it the various qualities pos-
sessed by wood, tortoise-shell, ivory or whalebone, and
9

130 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

to render it capable of enduring unharmed a high de-
gree of heat as well as of cold, and of resisting moist-
ure as well as the contact with acids. This effect is
obtained by combining it with sulphur either directly
or by means of bisulphide of carbon. Every one
knows the quantity and the diversity of objects that
are made from this light and yet hard vulcanite, from ar-
ticles of jewelry and ornament to scientific instruments
and the tools used in general industry. In fact In-
dia-rubber and its more recent brother gutta-percha,
assumes a greater number of transformations than the
magic wrand of the most potent fairy ever brought
about in Arabian tales. They run through the entire
list of useful and ornamental articles, from the breastpin
tipped with gold to the life-boat in the surges of the
ocean.

It was in 1736 that Condamine sent the first relia-
ble account of the new substance to the French Acad-
emy, describing it as the inspissated juice of a tree
called by the natives Hevee. In 1757 Fremeau found
the same tree in Cayenne, and it is now known to be
the produce of many trees growing in South America
and the East Indies. The most important of these is
one of the spurge tribe, the Siphonia elastica, found
in the dense forests on the banks of the Amazon, and
yielding the caoutchouc of Para; the Pemambuco
caoutchouc is furnished by the Hancomia speciosa,
found about Pernambuco and Bahia ; the Ticus elasti-
ca, or snake-tree, with a wood so light and porous as to
be fit only for fuel or charcoal, produces an abundant
supply of milk, which the natives use for lining the

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 133

inside of their water-pots, and making the caoutchouc
itself into candles. A kind of junglevine (urceola elas-
tica), of the Prince of Wales Island, is the main repre-
sentative of this class in that remote portion of our
globe. Caoutchouc is obtained in the following man-
ner : with a sharp instrument straight and sloping inci-
sions are made one above the other, the first about a
man's height from the ground, which penetrate beneath
the bark. At the foot of the incision a vessel made of
clay, and holding about a tumblerful, is placed to re-
ceive all the sap ; these bowls are filled in about three
hours, if the tree is good, and from this the milk is
poured into a calabash at the foot of the tree. The sap
is liquid, and generally white at the time of extraction ;
the brown color with which we are familiar is imparted
to it by foreign matter, which is mixed up with it, and
it is still further darkened by the fires of Urucari nuts,
which yield a thick oily smoke and are said to be of great
value in the process. The Indians have clay moulds
of bottles, animals, etc., which they dip into the milk
and hold over the smoke till dry, repeating this until
the rubber is of sufficient thickness, when they take
it off the mould and the native manufacture is at an
end. The caoutchouc is suspended in the albumen
of the sap, like cream in milk. In order to separate
the caoutchouc from the other matter, the whole is
put in three or four times its bulk of water, and the
valuable material rising to the surface is removed on
the following day.

All the countries that produce caoutchouc are
within the Torrid Zone; these are chiefly South

y

parts of

On this subjm, Hwnboldt states that the number of

y -..:.:? ::..-;- :? . v.-;;.r ::•.-: e.-:.i-,T.
:_>: :: ii.-< >,--::v.^ :. -\,r-:-^-: ;, _rr-^.: ::>
on Ae prodoctioo of «o«tchooc; for it has
dial the plants wfakh produce it under

tke tropies, wtea euhrrated in northern

- jv/.^:.i:;- v/:/..;-. >.^;v.-.".:,s :L-: .T'.UC ;:

of that same fianihr of which we are
about to speak, give different products. The juice
of

firedk milk; and Leopold YOU Bach

:L: :. .': -- :_A>f - >-; ': •-. ;.;.;. :LV-,
Tarrh%hlT. Bat all the euphorbureft are not eqnafly

li-ir^-l-.-?? : r :...: .•::.:.-.:;• :. --.: v.".---.: i- :-.:.. .:. .:

a deadbr paeon, and m thocoughlv

,7-:^ ;::.,,•.

~~~. .v-lfirf .: t..-; :.•.-., :r ::-.~.;.~:. :~ ;:. '."-rtit7-.il

iti :Lv T.:r.,-ttr-j

The sweet easa** is eaten as wnofe-

I-.-- - I'..!.- tLr :.it-.-.-s ::.t: t"_--ir -^-'. :.r
fittie. with gVMffM*^^ the frtfvnr of ttTbe Plant

:: I-l::/ -.: ^r-r ~L,: -.-.^ tlr " -_^kr I tLii

THE V.' OF VEGETATION. 135

In the midst of a dense forest in Guiana, the chief
of the tribe, after having stretched his hammock be-
tween two great magnolias, rests under the shade of
the large leaves of a banana-tree. He smokes indo-
lently, and watches the movements going on around
him. Meanwhile his wife crushes the manioc roots
she has painfully gathered, in the hollow of a tree, by
means of a wooden pestle ; wraps the pulp in a net
made of the leaves of a large lily, and suspends it
upon a fork, tying a heavy stone to the lower part, so
as to compress the contents and to squeeze out all the
juice of the manioc. This juice, as it drops, is re-
ceived in a calabash; and a little boy squatting by
its side, steeps his father's arrows in the deadly
liquid as it drops down; while the mother makes
a fire to roast the strained porridge, and thus to rid
it entirely of its volatile poison. After this, being
ground to powder between two stones, the i ••!•••
flour is ready for domestic use-
Meanwhile the bov also has finished his dangerous
« c1

task. The juice has deposited a delicate white starch,
which he separates from the liquid, and which, after
having been washed once more in fresh water turns

OUt to be tapioca ! In this Or a similar manner the

manioca and tapioca of the tropics are prepared ev-
erywhere.

The savage, having satisfied his hunt^er, flinnipfB
about in search of a new resting-pJaee; but woe to
him ! he has chanced to encamp under a redoubtable
manehineel tree ; rain suddenly falls, dropping from its
leaves upon him. and the unfortunate man awakens

136 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

suddenly, with pain racking his limbs, and blisters
and ulcers covering his whole body. If he escapes
with his life, it will be to cherish during the remain-
der of his days a wholesome fear of the danger of the
poisonous properties of the euphorbiacese.

Everywhere the manchineel enjoys the unenvia-
ble reputation of being a most dangerous tree, in the
shade of which it is imprudent to repose, since, as the
poet says, "pleasure dwells there by the side of
death." This evil reputation has its origin in the
poisonous qualities of the sap and the fruit of a tree
of the same kind, found in Africa — the arborescent
euphorbia. Like the former, this tree has a magnifi-
cent though even more peculiar appearance. The
thickness of its branches and foliage, which wholly ex-
clude the sun, seem to invite the weary traveller to
repose. The negroes have a way of taking advan-
tage of the delightfully cool shade and at the same
time avoiding the danger from the poisonous drop-
pings of the tree. They erect a thatched roof below
the lowest branches and repose in peace.

M. Tremaux, in a narrative of his excursion to the
Soudan, has an interesting passage respecting these
arborescent euphorbia.

" While taking a view of Cacane," he says, " I
asked one of the negroes who stood near me, to go
and seat himself under a great euphorbia which
stood in the foreground. At first he hesitated ; then
after a little he decided to yield ; but not without
raising his eyes many times in apprehension towards
the branches of the tree. I was about to climb upon

THE WONDER 8 OF VEGETATION. 137

a rock in order to break off a branch which I brought
home with me to France, but the negro seeing me ap-
proach, fled in terror from the shade of the deadly
tree, gesticulating wildly and shouting words in a lan-
guage I could not comprehend. His signs, however,
and a few Arab words uttered by one of the bystand-
ers : ( Do you mean to die ?' made me understand
that in touching the tree I was running a serious dan-
ger. But the thing was done and the broken branch
in my hand ; immediately a milky liquid flowed forth
—in much greater quantity than I could have imag-
ined from what I knew of these plants in other coun-
tries— covering my clothes and penetrating even to
my skin. The features and gestures of the negroes
expressed their pity and their fear. They made me
understand, that if the white juice touched one of the
numerous wounds which I at that time had on my
body, I should die ; and that it was dangerous even
to let it touch the skin.

"It is with this juice that they poison their weap-
ons in order to make their wounds mortal ; but they
first thicken it, till it acquires the consistency of
paste ; then they dip in it the points or blades of the
weapons they wish to poison."

Trees of this kind often reach twenty-four feet in
diameter, and seventy feet in circumference. The
greatest height of trees of this size is twenty-four feet.
The trunk and the large branches are of hard wood ;
the smaller branches consist mostly of pith and pa-
renchyme, sustained by a slender woody fibre.

138 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

TREACHEROUS PLANTS.

The remarkable quality which we have mentioned
in speaking of the " Treacherous Plants," producing
at one and the same time wholesome food and a ter-
rible poison, is even more characteristic in a more
striking degree of another class of plants. The
milky juice of some of these is rich in caoutchouc ; in
others it appears in the form of sweet milk, whole-
some and palatable, and in a third variety it assumes
the form of a deadly poison. We have spoken al-
ready of milk-trees proper, of trees producing caout-
chouc, and of arborescent euphorbias, but many of
these plants are more deadly than any we have yet men-
tioned. The savages of South America poison their
arrows with euphorbia-milk, and the natives of Ethi-
opia do the same at the Cape ; they employ pieces
of meat powdered with the pollen of Hyananche
globosa, as an infallible means of killing hyenas.

One species of euphorbia described by Martins
presents this remarkable peculiarity, that its milk,
when it is drawn from the tree in dark warm summer
nights, gives out a phosphorescent light.

The woorare, ourari, urali, etc., are nothing else
than the car are. In past times this substance
was believed to consist of a vegetable juice mixed
with the blood of the viper, the poison of the rattle-
snake, the saliva of serpents and other poisonous
substances. These statements were shown to be
false by Humboldt, Boussingault and other travel-
lers, who have had an opportunity of studying the

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 139

plants which produce it, the mode of extraction
which the Indians fallow, and their employment in
the hands of those who make cruel use of it. It is
a purely vegetable -substance, produced by a liane be-
longing to the genus Strychnos, and abounding east
of the mission of Esmaralda, on the left bank of the
Orinoco, but growing also on the eastern slopes of the
Cordilleras and in the forests upon the barlks of the
great equatorial rivers of South America. It is called
the mavacure liana (Strychnos toxiferab)

" When the bark of the mavacure is opened a
yellowish liquid," says Humboldt, " continues to ooze
out for several hours drop by drop. This filtered
juice is the poisonous liquid ; but it has not acquired
all its strength until it is concentrated by evaporation
in a large clay pot placed over a fire. The Indian
who filled the office of Poison Master, asked me from
time to time to taste this poison liquid. It is by the
bitterness of the taste that one judges whether the
poison has been sufficiently concentrated. There is
no danger in tasting curare, as it becomes fatal only
by coming in direct contact with the blood."

Other travellers, like Scomburgk and Poeppig,
have given us interesting descriptions of this prepara-
tion and of the deadly properties of the poison, which
are so overwhelming that the Indians still use it in
preference to the fire-arms of Europeans, the savage
arms himself with a long and straight tube ; the points
of his arrows, made of hard wood and a foot long, are
dipped in the curare, while the other end is wrapped
in a quantity of cotton, which makes it exactly fit the

14:0 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

tube. With this terrible weapon he endeavors to
surprise his enemy— perhaps some monster of the
wood, who, having captured a deer, is tranquilly re-
galing himself upon the body. Not the slightest
noise betrays the approach of the practised, cautious
footstep ; no eye beholds the long slender tube ; and the
winged messenger of death, propelled by the silent
breath <& the Indian, reaches sometimes after a flight
of thirty paces, its unsuspecting victim with unerring
certainty. However small the wound may be, the
animal falls to the ground in awful convulsions and
dies in a few minutes.

Schleiden states that a multitude of plants of the
same family contain similar poisons. Here, however,
the poisonous quality rests in their seeds, and this cir-
cumstance distinguishes them from those we have
mentioned. In the form of strychnine and buncine,
they_present to us the two most violent of all vege-
table poisons. The bean of S. Ignatius (Ignatius
amara) growing in Manilla, and the nux vomica
(Strychnos nux vomica) are found everywhere in the
tropics. The natives of Madagascar have a custom
recalling the ordeals of Europe in the middle ages,
by which they make the guilt or innocence of a per-
son depend upon the strength of his stomach. The
man accused of a crime, is obliged, in the presence of
the people and the priests, to swallow a Thangiu
nut ; if his stomach is strong enough to vomit up the
terrible poison, he is acquitted ; but if not, he is held
guilty, and immediately made to undergo his punish-
ment, for he dies on the instant.

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. i±\

POISON-TREES OF JAVA. — The Upas-Tree.
Many trees produce poison like the curare that
grows on the Orinoco, and the woorare, which is
found on the banks of the Amazon ; but the most ter-
rible of all is the upas, which grows in several parts
of East India, in Java, Borneo, Sumatra and the Cel-
ebes.

The Deadly lTpas.

Rumph, who has given us a description of it,
calls it the arbor toxieari. This tree has a thick
stem and extended branches. Its bark is brown and
knotty ; its wood is hard, of a pale yellow color, and
marked with black spots. Of all the different spe-
cies of strychnos (from which we obtain strychnine),
the upas and the mix vomica furnish the most vio-
lent poison. Astonishing facts, and still more aston-
ishing fictions are told of this wonderful plant ; we
will throw aside the fictions, and endeavor to find in

142 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

the facts enough to interest us. For recent travellers
have torn the veil of fables which has long surround-
ed and concealed the true nature of this remark-
able tree, but enough is left to engage our attention.
We give first, under reserve, what is said of it by
Thunberg, a famous botanist of Upsaloa, Sweden.

" The upas-tree, an evergreen," he says, " is easi-
ly recognized at a great distance. The ground
around it is sterile, and looks as if it had been
burned. The sap is of a dark-brown color, and be-
comes liquid by heat, like other resins. Those
who gather it have to employ the greatest care ;
covering the head, the hands, and the whole body,
to protect themselves from the poisonous emana-
tions of the tree, and especially from the drops
which fall from it. They avoid even approaching
too near, and they provide themselves with bam-
boos tipped with steel heads, having a groove in
the middle. A score of these long spears are struck
into the tree, and the sap runs down the groove in-
to the hollow bamboo, until it is stopped by the
first joint of the wood. The spears are left sticking
in the trunk for three or four hours, so that the sap
may fill up the space prepared for it, and have time
to harden, after which they are drawn out. The
part of the bamboo which contains the poison is
then broken off, and covered up with great care.
If kept for a year or two, the poison loses its vir-
ulence.

" The sap of the upas-tree produces spasms and
prostration. Persons passing beneath its branches,

UPAS TREE

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 14-5

bare-headed, lose their hair. A single drop falling
upon the skin produces inflammation. Birds can with
difficulty fly over the tree, and if they by any chance
alight on its branches, they fall dead. The soil
around is perfectly sterile to the distance of a stone's
throw. Any one wounded with a dart poisoned with
this resin is attacked by violent inflammation, followed
by convulsions, and dies in less than 15 minutes.
After death the skin is covered with dark spots, the
face becomes livid and swollen, and the whites of
the eyes turn yellow."

Foerset speaks thus of the effects of the juice of
the upas. " Being at Soura Charta," he says, " I
was present at the execution of three women. They
were conducted at 11 A. M , to the square opposite
the palace. The judge passed sentence upon them.
They were presented with the Koran, upon which
they had to swear that their sentence was just, and
this they did, placing one hand upon the book, the
other upon their breast, and raising their eyes to
heaven. Afterward the executioner proceeded to his
grim business in the following manner:

" Three stakes had been prepared, and to these
the convicts were bound. They remained in this po-
sition, saying their prayers, until the judge gave the
signal, when the executioner pricked each of them
in the breast with a lancet that had been dipped in
the resin of the upas. Instantly they were seized
with violent trembling, then with convulsions, and
in six minutes neither of the three survived. I saw
that their skin was marked with livid spots, their
10

146 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

faces were swollen, their color bluish, and their eves
yellow.

" I had occasion to witness another execution at
Samarang, when seven Malays were put to death, and
the effects of the poison were just the same."

The Dutch writer gives additional narratives,
which we must, however, look upon as fabulous ; but
as in the foregoing, he deals with facts which are
confirmed by other writers, and are explained by the
known violence of the poison, we have mentioned
his statements.

The forests of Java present little that is attract-
ive to European explorers, and in passing through
them, a feeling of fear is mingled with curiosity.
" On all sides," says Schleiden, " palm-trees armed
with thorns and long prickles; seeds with their
edged leaves sharp as knives, repel with their dan-
gerous weapons, all those who attempt to pass into
the primitive forest ; and everywhere an undergrowth
of formidable nettles threatens the intruder. Great
black ants torment the traveller with their danger-
ous bites, and crowds of innumerable insects follow
and persecute him on his path. After having avoid-
ed or overcome all these obstacles, he arrives before
massive ramparts of bamboo, thick as the arm and
50 feet high, whose hard, glassy bark turns the
edge of the best hatchet. When this new obstruction
is overcome, the traveller at last reaches the majestic
dome of the virgin forest, properly so-called ; gigan-
tic trunks of bread-fruit-trees, and of the teak, the
wood of which is almost a? hard as iron ; leguminous

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

plants, with their clusters of splendid flowers; bar-
ringtonias, fig-trees, and laurels, form the colonnades
which support the wonderful leafy vault.

Monkeys are sporting merrily from branch to
branch above him, provoking him by making him
the mark at which they throw their fruits ; as he ap-
proaches, he sees the orang-outang with severe and
melancholy aspect, leaping from a moss-covered rock,
and with the aid of a club, making his way into the
thicket. The forests abound in animal life, unlike
our own silent forests of the West. Here climbing
plants rise spirally round the colossal pillars, and
overtop the gigantic trees, forming from the root to
a height of 100 feet, nothing but a single leafless
rope. The enormous leaves green and glossy, alter-
nate with huge tendrils which support them, while
fragrant umbels composed of rich clusters of white
flowers, hang about in all directions. This plant, of
the family of the Apocyneal (Strychnos tiente\ fur-
nishes in its roots the terrible rajah upas, or poi-
son of princes.

A tiger having received the very slightest wound
with a weapon that has been dipped in this poison,
or struck with a little wooden arrow blown through
the tube called the sarba-cane, begins to tremble,
stands on his feet for a minute, and then tumbles
over as if struck by lightning, and dies in convul-
sions. Curiously enough, the part of this tree that
rises above the earth, is harmless, and even the sap
has no dangerous properties. As the traveller ad-
vances, he meets with a splendid tree, the trunk of

14:8 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

which rises free of branches, from 60 to 80 feet high,
bearing aloft a superb crown of foliage, which over-
top the humbler vegetation around. But woe is the
traveller, if his skin touches the milky juice which
its bark contains in abundance, and which it is ever
ready to spurt forth. Blisters and ulcers much more
painful and terrible, though not unlike those pro-
duced by the poisonous sumac- tree, appear at once.
This is the autjar of the Javanese ; the poJion upas
(poison tree) of the Malays ; the ypo of the inhabi-
tants of Celebes and the Philippines. (Antiaris
toxicaria.) The use of this upas poison, a prac-
tice which at one time prevailed through nearly all
the islands of the South, is giving way to Euro-
pean firearms everywhere except in the most re-
mote and inaccessible parts of these islands.

THE VALLEY OF DEATH.

We cannot conclude this short sketch of poisonous
trees, and especially the description of the upas-tree
of Java, without saying a word about that valley the
deadly character of which is attributed by the igno-
rant natives to the exhalations that rise from these
terrible trees. Let us here again follow the narrative
of Schleiden.

Leaving the dense virgin forest the traveller ascends
a small hill and suddenly there is spread out before him
a fearful wilderness, a genuine realm of death. The
small level valley shows not a trace of vegetable life ;
nothing is seen but the bare soil burnt by the sun's

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 149

fierce heat. Death alone dwells here, and the ground
is literally strewn with skeletons. Often a tiger may
be seen lying as destruction seized him in the very
act of leaping upon his prey, or an unclean bird as he
swooped from the clouds to seize upon the carcass.
Piles of coleoptera ants and other insects are lying
here and there and bear witness to the justness of the
name, Valley of Death, which the natives have bestow-
ed upon this place of desolation. But the fearful

The Valley of Death (Java).

character of the valley does not arise from the tree,
as was formerly believed, but from the emanations of
carbonic acid which, because of its specific gravity,
does not mix with the upper layers of the atmosphere.
As in* the famous Grotto del Cane near Naples, and
the Yapor Cave at Pyrmont, in Germany, here also
this gas brings infallible death to all living beings
that breathe near the ground. Man alone, to whom
God has given the faculty of walking upright, trav-

150 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

erses with impunity this deadly valley, since these
choking vapors do not reach to the height of his head.
Just as the oppression felt in ascending the Himalaya
to the height of 15,000 or 16,000 feet, was attributed
by the natives to the poisonous emanations of certain
herbs, so the terrible phenomena of the Valley of Death
also were formerly charged to the exhalations of the
upas-tree, and assumed all the more formidable pro-
portions in the mind of credulous natives and ig-
norant travellers, as no antidote has yet been dis-
covered.

We do not envy the inhabitants of the tropics
their cow-tree, and, content with the gift of useful
caoutchouc, we readily give up all the rest of the luxu-
riant vegetation of those countries, which combine
such terrors with all their beauties. As yet no anti-
dote known is able to counteract the effects of any of
these poisons, which as so many dismal enigmas
threaten the human race. They confirm the saying
that the brilliant light of tropical nature necessitates
equally dark shadows, and that more than one formi-
dable dragon as yet guards the entrance of these gar-
dens of the Hesperides.

The Oaks.

CHAPTER IX.

LONG-LIVED TREES AND GIANT TKEES.

1. Longevity of Trees.

OF all the objects with which nature has clothed the
earth, nothing gives us a clearer idea of the age
of our globe than those trees whose branches have
sheltered generation after generation for thousands of
years. There is something mysterious and fascinating
in the form of an immense, great tree. For our own
part we have rarely witnessed the new life of spring,
clothing, year after year, a tree with its splendid, ever-
new apparel of leaves, without being deeply impress-
ed and almost overwhelmed with the comparative
brevity of human life. The monuments of man live

152 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

longer than man himself, to be sure ; but they do not
live with the life of nature. The mountains also
have witnessed the changes of ages, but they have no
individuality with which we can become familiar.

The tree, On the contrary, like the flower, is an
individual which watches us and stands before our
eyes as a silent witness of our existence. That tree
existed long before we ever saw the light — it has
seen the ages that preceded us ; men without number
have passed at its feet who were our distant ancestors
during these mysterious epochs previous to our exist-
ence. And when we shall pass away, and the place of
our habitation shall know us no more, the tree will
remain, calm and silent as to-day ; it will put forth its
leaves every spring, and other generations will come
and play around its foot as we have done.

Large trees count their age by centuries. Who
has not heard of the " Oak of the Partisans " in the
department of the Vosges, which a few feet above
the ground measures 40 feet in circumference and 16
feet at that part of its trunk where it sends out its
main branches ? Its height is 101 feet, its diameter 75
feet. It is nearly 650 years of age, and dates back to
the days of Philip Augustus, when " partisans," as the
rebels of the day were called, laid France waste.

At the base of the southern slope of Mont Blanc,
in the forest of Ferri, near the pass of that name,
there .is a larch 18 feet in circumference above the
collar of the root, which, by its size, has been pre-
sumed to be 800 years of age.

Not far from this larch is a pine on the mountains

THE WON DEES OF VEGETATION. 153

of Beque, which is called by the inhabitants of the
country " the stable of the chamois," because it serves
as a shelter for these animals during winter. It meas-
ures nearly 24 feet in circumference and 15 feet at the
first branches. In spite of its magnificent growth and
still verdant foliage, it is said to be 1,200 years old.

At first -sight it seems astonishing that the appear-
ance of a tree should enable us to determine, at least
approximately, its age, and yet the explanation is very
simple.

Every year a new layer of wood forms itself upon
the tree, and when the trunk is sawn through the
number of years it has lived is indicated by the
number of concentric rings ; since each ring in the
wood represents the new layer which has been formed
that year. A tree that shows a hundred rings, is
generally regarded as having lived a century. It is
by these observations upon the trees themselves or
upon others of the same species, and by ingenious de-
ductions, that botanists succeed in determining the age
of trees.

The plants which in all parts of the world acquire
the most remarkable size are the yews, the chestnuts,
several bamboos, the mimosas, the cisalpinias, the fig-
trees, the mahogany-trees, the cypresses, and the wes-
tern plane-trees. We do not speak of the race of gi-
gantic trees in California, which surpass all others, and
the dimensions of which will be given in a future
chapter.

154 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

THE AGE OF SOME TREES.

At Fortingall, in Scotland, there is a yew-tree
more than 3,000 years old. In France, at Foullebec
(Department of the Eure), a yew measured in 1822
appeared to be 1,100 or 1,200 years old.

Adanson measured at Cape Yert a baobab over
ninety feet in circumference ; and by comparing it
with younger trees of the same species he was led to
believe that this giant was 5,000 years old ; but
doubts have since arisen whether the principle of
measuring by annual rings can be applied to this fam-
ily of trees. Golberg, measured another which was
112 feet in circumference, and consequently must
have been still older. But the most remarkable is
the colossal pine of California (Sequoia), which rises
to the height of 300 feet, and is thirty feet in diam-
eter. The concentric layers of one of these immense
trunks, if correctly measured, prove that their age is
6,000 years, which would have made him contem-
poraneous with the earliest dynasties of Eygpt.

In Europe the lime-tree or linden, seems to be
capable of living the longest and attaining the most
gigantic proportions. The linden-tree of Neustadt,
in the kingdom of Wiirtemberg, is a remarkable in-
stance. Its magnificent crown measures 400 feet in
circumference, and its branches are upheld by 106
stone columns. The tree was an old tree in the year
1 229, when a great fire destroyed the old town, and the
new town was, according to a document still extant,
built close to " the big tree." In the year 1558, the

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 155

Duke of Wiirtemberg surrounded it with four porches,
and caused his armorial bearings to be painted upon
two of these columns. At the top the linden-tree
of Neustadt divides into two great branches, one of
which was broken by a tempest in 1773, while the
other at the present day is still nourishing and 110
feet in length.

The linden-tree of Freiburg, though of smaller
size, is of historical interest. It has grown up from a
branch planted on the day of the battle of Morat, be-
side the corpse of a young Freiburger who had
died on the spot from over-exertion in hastening to
cheer his native town by the welcome news of the
victory.

The linden-tree of Yillars-en-Moing, near Frei-
burg, is still older, for it was already famous in 1476,
when this great battle was fought. Its circumference
does not measure less than 40 feet ; its height is 75
feet ; and its crown is still a vast mass of almost im-
pervious foliage.

After the lime-tree, the oak grows to the greatest
size in Europe.

England possesses very remarkable specimens both
for age and size. The following are some of the
measurements :

The famous oak of Clipson Park is 1 ,500 years old,
since the park, which belongs to the Duke of Port-
land, existed before the Norman Conquest. The larg-
est oak in England is the oak of Calthorpe, in York-
shire. It is 78 feet in circumference at its base.

The Shire oak, so called because it stood on a spot

156 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

where the counties of Nottingham, Derby and York
met, and its shadow thus covered a portion of each,
extends its foliage over an era of 780 square yards.
The most productive of oaks ever known, was one in
the county of Monmouth. It was cut down in 1810 ;
the bark alone was sold for 200 pounds sterling ; and
the wood for 670 pounds. (These figures are tak-
en from the British Review.} In the manor of
Tredegar, in the same county, a hall 42 feet long by
27 feet wide, was floored and wainscoted with the
timber of a single oak-tree taken from the park.

The oak of Autrage, in the arrondissement of Bed-
fort (Upper Khine), one of the largest trees in
France, was felled a few years ago It was 15 feet in
diameter at the base and more than 42 feet in circum-
ference. The trunk alone produced 4,500 feet of
saleable timber. This oak is believed to have been
in existence in Druidical times.

It is not necessary to travel far from Paris to see
a number of very respectable specimens of vegetable
antiquity. Without going as far even as the forest of
Fountainebleau, and on the road thither, it you stop
8-t the station of Montgeron or of Brunoy, and make
an excursion into the beautiful forest of Senart, you
will come to the little village of Champrosay, near
which there is a " cross roads," at which eight roads
meet. In the centre of this opening stands the old
oak of Antein. The trunk is 18 feet in circumfer-
ence ; and the space covered with the foliage is 90
square feet. Many of its branches have been cut
down — they were no longer useful as formerly, to bear

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 159

the evidence of the owner's power of jurisdiction, who
used to hang culprits there.

Among the ancient and marvellous trees which ex-
cite the interest of travellers in the highest degree,
the immense oak at Allouville, near Yvetot, must be
numbered among those to which memory most fre-
quently returns. Much has been said and written
about this tree ; and though the simple villagers that
dwell around know nothing of all the scientific dis-
cussions of which it has been the subject, they regard
it with pride and with tender affections. Their an-
cestors have sat beneath in its shade ; and their own
children are now playing around it, as so many gen-
erations have done before them.

It stands in the centre of a graveyard, and often
peasants from all the country around come to kneel
under its heavy branches and there to pour out to
God their sorrows and their grief. Just above the
ground it measures thirty feet in circumference, and
twenty -four feet at a man's height. In the interior of
the hollow trunk a little chapel has been fitted up,
and above, as it were in the second story, a rustic her
mit lives, while still higher in the tree a small belfry,
surmounted by a cross, has been built and crowns the
marvellous edifice.

This oak cannot be less than 900 years old. The
interior was fitted up as early as the seventeenth centu-
ry and the chapel dedicated to the virgin. During
the Revolution ignorant fanatics, who delighted in de-
struction, attempted on several occasions to burn down
this venerable historic monument ; but the inhabitants

160 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

of Allouville and its neighborhood, who regarded the
old oak with sacred fondness, turned out in arms an:!
protected it against the Vandals.

Let us hope that many generations yet will enjoy
its broad and pleasant shade.

The aspect of this tree excites a deeper interest
perhaps than that of many structures left us by races
existing no more. There seems to be something pe-
culiarly eloquent in this great tree, that year :if'iT \ (Mi-
renews its youth, though it has seen as many graves
close and open again as the cold and silent stones of
ancient temples; and we know of no history that has
touched us more deeply than the humble and pious
traditions of kings and warriors who have rested
under its shade, of troubadours who have sung its
praise, and of the tempests that have raged against it
without ever impairing its beauty.

One day on a pleasure tour returning from Caude-
bec to Yvetot, we went out of our way to visit this
famous oak. What struck us particularly about it
was to find that little else was left of the tree but the
bark. It is entirely hollow from the root to the top,
and the interior is lined with wood, carefully plastered
and wainscoted, like a monk's cell or an oratory, and
yet the tree is still as green as those of the forest near
by, and bears every year abundant crops of acorns.

The old chapel oak of Allouville is a monument
of comparatively modest pretensions as to antiquity
compared with the oak of Montravaii, which is not less
than 1,500 and perhaps 2,000 years old. This oak,
which stands in the court-yard of the farm of Montra-

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION'. 163

vail, near Saintes, is without doubt the patriarch of the
forest of the Saintonge and indeed of the whole of
France. It belongs to the species of Quercus longaeva,
and its admirable preservation promises to. bear the
burden of ages to come. It is crowned each year

O t/

with green and abundant foliage, perhaps for the two
thousandth time. On a level with the ground, its di-
ameter is nearly 30 feet and its circumference over 80
feet. The spread of its branches is 380 feet in circum-
ference.

The decayed part of the interior forms a hall nine
to twelve feet in diameter and nine feet high. A cir-
cular bench has been cut out of the live wood for the ac-
commodation of visitors, and around the table in the
centre a dozen people can dine comfortably. It is dec-
orated with a living tapestry of ferns and mosses, and
light is admitted by a window on the left and an-
other in the door.

Of this tree also but little remains save the bark.
This is the fate of almost all ancient plants which lose
their pith, their heart and their wood, and continues
to subsist only by means of their outer skeletons.
Such is the case especially with willows. We were
lately exploring the banks of the Marne, under the
magnificent viaducts of Chaumont, when one of these
willows arrested our attention. There was nothing
left of it but a mere shell ; the tree was hollow from
top to bottom. It was still nourishing, and besides a
thousand parasites, animal and vegetable, lived in its
countless cracks and crevices.

Even beeches are known to have reached an almost

104 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

fabulous old age in some parts of England. Such are
the famous Burnham beeches, near Slough, which
for size and picturesque beauty are unequalled. Like
most pollarded trees, their girth is enormous, and their
moss-grown roots are thrown out in curious contortions,
grasping the ground as if setting all storms at defiance.
Tradition says that Harold's bowmen were encamped
in the wood a few years before the Norman Conquest,
and that the Danes pollarded the beeches. An Eng-
lish poet says of them :

" Scathed by lightning's bolts, the wintry storms,

A giant brotherhood, ye stand sublime ;
Like some huge fortress each majestic form

Still frowns defiance to the power of time ;
Cloud after cloud the storms of war have roll'd
Since ye your countless years of long descent have told."

Switzerland, so remarkable for the variety of its
natural treasures, adds to its beautiful scenery, pictur
esque landscapes and matchless prospects, special beau-
ties, and among these latter some of the most cele-
brated trees known in Europe.

On the banks of the Lake of Geneva stands the
mansion of Meillerie, and the rocks on which it is
built are divided from the water only by the road to
the Simplon. A little distance further on you come
to Neuve-Gelle, which has one of the most famous
chestnut-trees of the world. Ever since the fifteenth
century this chestnut- tree has given shelter to a mod-
est hermitage, and no doubt it was at that time already
a tree of respectable age. At present its base measures

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 167

forty-six feet in circumference ; but having been re-
peatedly strucfe by lightning, it has been stunted in its
growth ; the girth of its branches nevertheless gives
it a venerable aspect, and each summer crowds of
visitors come to see the famous tree and to rest under
its shade.

At Prilly, near Lausanne, there is a linden-tree
under which 500 years ago justice was administer-
ed. The municipality of Lausanne watches over its
preservation, dear as it is to the whole canton,
and a little fountain serves to keep its roots moist.
Nor must we forget the baths of Evian, where, a little
below the road grow two rose-trees of the same form
and almost equal in height and width. These are
not gigantic monuments, like the colossal trees of
which we have spoken, but they no less surprise trav-
ellers by their size. For these marvellous rose-trees are
certainly of respectable size for flowers — their trunks
measure more than ten inches in circumference.

THE CHESTNUT ON MOUNT ETNA.

The chestnut of JSTeuve-Gelle cannot compare with
this rival, under whose shade a hundred horses have
found shelter. It is said that the Queen Joan, of Ara-
gon, ascended Mount Etna during her voyage from
Spain to Naples, and that all the nobility of Catania ac-
companied her in her excursion. A tempest broke out,
but the queen and her whole suite found easily shelter
under the foliage of this immense tree.

" This famous tree of so vast a diameter," says
Jean Houel, the first traveller who gave a description

168 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

of it in the last century, " is entirely hollow, and
subsists now only by means of its bark, but does not
the less cover itself every spring with new foliage.
The hollow of this tree is so large that the people of
the neighborhood have constructed a house within,
with an oven for drying chestnuts, filberts and almonds,
and other fruits which they wish to preserve, as is
the common usage in Sicily. When they require
fuel, they take a hatchet and help themselves from
the part of the tree around their dwelling. For
this reason this magnificent chestnut is nearly de-
stroyed.

" Some people believe that this colossus consists of
several chestnut-trees, which, pressing the one against
the other and no longer maintaining their individual
bark, have grown together and appear as a single tree
to careless eyes. This is a mistake. All the parts,
though mutilated by time and the hand of man, be-
long to one and the same trunk."

Careful examination seems really to prove that all
these diverging branches have but one system of roots.
Moreover, Brydone, wTho visited it in 1770, states
that his guide, following up the traditions of the
country, assured him that at a time long past a single
unbroken bark covered the trunk all around, although
at the present day only a few remnants of it can be
seen. Canon Recupero, a Sicilian naturalist, affirmed
in the presence of the English traveller and many
other witnesses, that the root of this colossal tree was
a single one. The best proof in support of the one-
ness of this tree is the example furnished by other

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 17]

chestnut-trees on Mount Etna, which have a diameter
of thirty-six feet.

The tree we are describing is 160 feet in circum-
ference— it is impossible to assign a limit to its prob-
able age.

At the present day an opening sufficiently large
to allow two carriages to pass through it abreast,
penetrates it from side to side, but this circumstance
does not prevent the venerable tree from covering
itself every year with bloom and fruit.

It ought to be added, however, in conclusion, that
it was the custom of ancient horticulturists to plant
around a single shoot a number of others of the same
species, so as to produce the appearance of a single
tree, which time would mature to a colossal size. They
peeled off the bark on the inside, and soon a single
bark came to envelope the whole. This practice was
pursued especially with olive-trees.

THE SMYRNA PLANE-TREE.

In the middle of the plain of Smyrna, in Asia
Minor, near the road that leads to Bournabat, is to be
seen the old plane-tree represented in our illustration.
Its singular form is not more surprising than its di-
mensions.

Bournabat is a village containing a grotto, in
which, according to tradition, Homer wrote the Iliad.
This picturesque place is the favorite retreat of the
rich merchants of Smyrna, who have built here their
country houses. But the pedestrians, and even the

172 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

horsemen travelling from the city to the country, love
to pursue a path running parallel to and near the
main road, which passes under this marvellous vege-
table gate, formed by the divisions of the trunk.
The two stems, though divided, are sufficiently strong
to bear the enormous weight of the plane-tree, the
lofty branches of which afford a view over one of the
most lovely bays of the Asiatic coast.

From this point we can see the Oriental ceme-
teries of Smyrna, the most famous next to those of
Pera and Scutari, dark with the sombre shades of
countless cypresses. The view commands the plain,
also, from the eastern limits of the great city to the
fertile slopes in the west, that fall into the sea.

THE PLANE-TREE OF COS.

Cos, the celebrated island of the Sporades, that
gave birth to Hippocrates, the greatest of the physi-
cians, and to Apelles, the greatest of the painters of
Greece, contains in the centre of the public square, a
magnificent plane-tree, famous throughout the world.
Its far-spreading branches cover the whole square.
Left to themselves, these branches would break of
their own weight, if the inhabitants had not under-
taken to support them on columns of marble. They1
devote to this monarch of trees a kind of worship
not less sincere, nor less profound, than they pay to
the surrounding edifices, -the last witnesses of their
former grandeur.

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 173

THE PLANE-TREE OF GODFREY OF BOUILLON.

What is called the plane-tree of Godfrey of Bouil-
lon, is rather a system of nine trees forming three
very close groups. Martins, who has seen and de-
scribed it, regards it as the most colossal plant in ex-
istence ; and Mr. Gautier calls it " not a tree, but a
forest." " Commencing from the east," says the first
of these writers, " we first perceive two trunks joined
together, which, at a height of three feet above ground,
measure 35 feet in circumference. A space of 15 feet
has been hollowed out by fire. Then comes a single
trunk 17 feet in circumference. The last group con-
sists of six trunks, forming, so to speak, one tree, over
70 feet in circumference. This enormous trunk also
has been hollowed by fire, for Turkish barbarism ad-
mires nothing, and respects nothing. A horse put up
in this cavity, was perfectly comfortable in his new
stable." Martins estimates the height of this vege-
table mass to be over 180 feet. The space cover-
ed by the foliage is 340 feet in circumference.
From the tents under the shelter of the tree, one can
see Bujugdere, a village on the Bosphorus, not far
from which is the famous plateau of Godfrey of Bou-
illon.

THE YEW OF LA MOTTE-FEUILLY.

This yew-tree is at once the monument of nature
and of history. A monument of nature, for it bears
traces of an age that must be counted by centuries,
>•*» trunk being not less than 24 feet in circumfer-

174 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

ence, while the shadow cast by its still green branch-
es, covers an extent of 70 feet. A monument of his-
tory, for after seeing the Roman legions pass, it was
watered by the tears of Charlotte d'Albret, the .un-
fortunate wife of Caesar Borgia, Duke of "Valentinois,
and by those of Jeanne, of France, divorced from
Louis XII., who came hither to mingle her grief
with that of her cousin.

At present one-half of the tree is dead, and no
longer reclothes itself with foliage in the spring ; but
the main trunk remains a permanent monument of
an age long gone by. This yew stands in one of the
courts of the feudal castle of la Motte-Feuilly, not
far from the road leading from Chatre to Chateau-
meillant, on the borders of the former provinces of
Berry and la Marche.

THE ELM OF BRIGNOLES.

There is in the department of the Yar, a little
river called the Caranci, which now flows outside of
the walls of Brignoles, but which formerly passed,
if we believe the local tradition, through the centre
of the square which still bears its name, at the foot
of a venerable elm. This aged tree was already
well known in the fifteenth century, having witnessed
great events, and given shelter to countless guests.
In the sixteenth century, Michel de PHopital sang
its magnificent proportions, to while away the time
of his exile in Provence. King Charles IX. was
present on the 25th of October, 1564, at a to/7 cham-
petre, which was given under this gigantic el in

T'lK <Y''VMO;i!-: OF TKONS.

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 177

Now this ancient patriarch of woods is supported by
a wooden column, which is truly the staff of old

THE SYCAMORE OF TRONS.

In the long valley of the Varder Rlieintlial,
which shelters the Rhine in its infancy, stands the
little town of Trons. Near the village, a venerable
tree covers with its vast crown of leaves, a small
chapel. In 1424, deputies of all the communities of
the valley assembled under its branches in order to
form the federation which resulted in the Republic
of Grisons. The fourth centennary of this memor-
able event was celebrated in 1824, and in memory of
the occasion, the little chapel was built, on the por-
tico of which was the following inscription : " You
are called to Liberty — Where the Spirit of God is,
there is deliverance — Our fathers hoped in Thee, oh !
Lord, and Thou hast made them free." This tree
was long called the plane-tree of Trons, and it is un-
der this name that it is still known generally. It is,
however, not a plane-tree, but a true sycamore.

At the elevation at which it grows, the plane-
trees finds no longer the conditions under which it
thrives.

At 20 inches above the soil, it is 28 feet in cir-
cumference.

In his journey to Nuremburg, Mr. Edouard

Charton mentions a visit which he paid to the old

linden-tree in that town, " planted," he says, " by

the Empress Ivunigunde." Formerly, on the occasion

12

178 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

of great festivals held in this German city, dances
were held under its shelter. Its branches then cov-
ered the entire court-yard in which it stands. On the
day on which Albrecht Durer's father took up his res-
idence in the ancient town, in the year 1445, the pa-
trician, Philip Pirkleimer, celebrated his wedding un-
der this linden-tree. Four statues surround the tree
now, representing four ancient emperors of Germany.

There is nothing remarkable from a botanical
point of view, about the favorite tree of the poet Al-
exander Pope, near Binfield. It is a poor beach al-
most bare of leaves and branches, withered, and weak
with age, and half destroyed by lightning.

Yet, in approaching it, a feeling of respect stirs
our whole being. What a mysterious power there
dwells in our association of ideas, which draw even
inanimate things within the circle of our sympathies,
and admit them, as it were, to the number of our
friends.

Seven miles from "Windsor stands the tree to
which Pope came in his youth, to dream away the
hours, and to receive his first impressions of the outer
world. Its bark is covered with inscriptions in honor
of the poet, and all around, on trees and stones, are
engraved extracts from his principal works.

In the English Park which surrounds the Italian
Villa of Feuillancourt stands a gigantic poplar, which

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 179

is entirely covered with a mass of ivy, growing larger
and thicker every year. This originally sprung from
a slip planted by Jean Jacques Rousseau, who was
here as the guest of a gentleman to whom the estate
at that time belonged.

The manner in which Rousseau put a sudden ter-
mination to the friendship between His host and him-
self is rather curious. The Duke of Noailles, propri-
etor of a very beautiful park at Saint Germain, wished
to see and chat with Ron >seau. As a direct invitation
from the duke would certainly have been refused, for
we know the misanthropic character of Rousseau, and
his aversion to the world, the duke resolved to em-
ploy a stratagem, and requested the poet's host, Tro-
chereau, to bring his friend into the park on the plea
of making a botanical excursion. The duke was to
wait behind the gate, and when the poet passed he
was to appear as if by accident and invite both to
come and see his collection of plants. All went well
up to the moment, when the philosopher caught sight
of the duke. In an instant he disappeared, and Tro-
chereau sought him in vain. On the following day
Rousseau wrote to his friend, informing him that from
that day he would cease to know him.

There exists at Paris, in the Jardin des Plantes, a
tree 230 years of age — Robin's acacia.

This plant, we are officially informed, has been
the mother-plant of all the innumerable acacias which
now adorn the gardens and woods of Europe and
America. It stands in a square near the Rue de Buf-
fon, but its worm-eaten stem, full of chinks that have

180 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

been stopped with plaster, has been protected by an
iron armor. As may well be imagined, nothing has
been neglected that can prolong the existence of this
.patriarch of locusts, well known to all visitors of the
1 Jardin des Plantes, who every spring eagerly come and
examine its branches to see whether there is still life
in the old plant.* But evidently its days are number-
ed. The sap, the life blood of the tree, circulates
sluggishly through it, and a hundred signs proclaim
that this tree, the oldest of all acacias, will soon be no
more.

Placed at the extremity of the museum of miner-
alogy, in a part of the collection- but little frequented,
it does not attract the attention of visitors to the same
extent as the famous cedar of Lebanon, though per-
haps it is really more worthy of notice. It was plant-
ed in 1635 — a century before the cedar — in the place
where it still stands, by Vespasian Robin. The father
of this- naturalist had received it some time previously
from North America, and hence its botanical name of
Robinia. This was the same year in which the Jar-
din Royal' was definitely established by an edict of
Louis XIII. , and of the trees that were in existence at
that time, this is the only one that remains. It is
also the first acacia that ever came to Europe. It has
supplied not only France but Europe with one of the
most useful as well as most beautiful species of trees.
Not far from this acacia were formerly to be seen the
first saphora brought from Japan, and one of the first
horse-chestnuts from India that was ever seen in
Europe.

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 181

The tree of the " Seven Brothers," in the forest
of Yillers-Cotterets is remarkable for its seven branch-
es, which have been so disposed as to sustain a floor
and gallery without injury to its foliage.

Walnut-trees live to a great age and reach occa-
sionally gigantic proportions. One of the most mar-
vellous is to be seen at Balaklava, in the Crimea. It
produces each year 100,000 nuts, and is the property
of five families.

The table of St. Nicholas, in Lorraine, mentioned
by De Candolle, gives one an idea of the size to which
these trees grow. This table is 24 feet wide and is
all in one piece.

THE MAPLE OF MATIBO.

This plant, the type of the " Lower trees " with
which the skilled horticulturist ornaments our gardens,
is especially remarkable for its architectural form.
This variety of the sycamore is not, in fact, a marvel
of vegetation ; and, strictly speaking, it is not on its
own merits to be classed among the extraordinary
plants which have already been described — plants
which owe to nature alone this distinguishing feature.
It is to be seen in its perfection at Matibo, in the vi-
cinity of Savigliano, near Coni, in Piedmont. The
skill and perseverance of the horticultural architect
has made an astonishing metamorphosis of it. In its
cultivated state it appears like a structure of two sto-
ries. Each of these has eight windows naturally form-
ed and can contain twenty people. The flooring is
managed by a skilful arrangement of the branches,

182 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

which are carefully interwoven, and the leaves form a
natural carpet. The birds of the air sing amid the
the green leaves, and are not disturbed by the people
that sit at the artificially formed windows.

More elegant than the oak of Allouville which we
have already described, this sycamore does not ap-
pear to belong to the same category. It is only men-
tioned here as a type of the trees manipulated by art,
with which gardeners decorate country houses.

THE TALLEST TREES.

In closing our description of the most remarkable
specimens of the largest trees in nature, we have to
mention in the first place the dragon-tree of Orotava.

" This colossal dragon-tree," says the author of the
Tableaux de la Nature, " is found in the garden of M.
Franqui, in the little town of Orotava, one of the most
pleasant places in the world. When we climbed the
Peak of Tenerifte, in 1799, we found that the circum-
ference of this tree was about 45 feet some little dis-
tance above the ground. At the top it was nearly
80 feet, which, considering its girth at the surface of
the soil, is not a little surprising. Tradition states
that among the Gouanches this tree was an object of
veneration, as the olive was among the Athenians,
the plane among the Lydians, and the banana among
the inhabitants of Ceylon."

In the year 1402 the dragon-tree of Orotava was
accurately measured by the companions of Bethen-
court, at the time when they discovered the island, and
it was then as large and also as hollow as it is to-day

TUB DRAGON TREE.

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 185

From this statement we might form a guess as to the
age of this famous tree, remembering at the same time
how slowly it grows. Berthelot says, in comparing the
young dragon-trees in the neighborhood with this gi-
ant : " The calculation which we make as to the age
of the latter inflame the imagination."

The dragon-tree has been cultivated from the re-
motest times, in the Canaries, Madeira, in Porto-Santa ;
and a very careful botanist, Leopold Yon Buch, has seen
it growing wild in the island of Teneriffe ; it is not,
therefore, as people have for a long time believed, a
native of the East Indies. It is found at the Cape of
Good Hope, on the Isle de Bourbon, in China and in
New Zealand. Different varieties of this tree are
found in these remote countries ; but it does not exist
at all in the New World. Aiton's Dracaena of the
north is nothing more than a Convallaria. Borda
measured the dragon-tree of the Yilla Franqui in
1771. It is said that in the fifteenth century, soon
after the Spanish conquest, mass was celebrated on a
little altar that had been erected in the hollow of its
trunk.*

The monumental character of these plants, and the
degree of respect with which they are regarded, have
made naturalists curious to ascertain their age and to
measure more exactly their dimensions. De Candolle,
linger, and other distinguished botanists, do not hesi-
tate to state that many dragon-trees now existing date
back to the earliest periods of our history, to a time,

* Unfortunately, this famous tree was completely destroyed
by a hurricane in the autumn of 1837.

186 THE WON DEES OF VEGETATION.

in fact, when even the history of Greece and of Italy
was but just beginning. The sterility of these plants
is one cause of their longevity.

By the side of the dragon-trees, which in spite of
their enormous dimensions belong, strictly speaking,
to the same class as our asparagus, may be placed the
Adansonias or baobabs, which are certainly among the
largest and oldest inhabitants of our planet. The
earliest description of these trees is dated 1454, and
was written by a Venetian, Louis Cadamosto. He
found at the mouth of the Senegal a number of these
trees, the circumference of which was about 100 feet.
Perrotet says he saw baobabs over 30 feet in diam-
eter.

Among the regions remarkable for their vegetable
products we must, in passing, mention the Island of
Tahiti — the Queen of Oceanica.

Without fully adopting the opinion of Bougain-
ville as to the magnificence of this island, and with-
out painting the inhabitants in the glowing colors
used by Bernardin de Saint-Pierre, we must repeat
what has been so often stated, that for wonderful veg-
etation the South Seas are the most astonishing. The
natural productions seen in the islands of this region
make it the most famous in the world.

In Tahiti especially, the vegetable kingdom shows
the greatest perfection. " All along the coast," says
Prat, "grow in abundance the Artocarpus incisa,
Forester's Pine, the banana, the cocoa-nut, the Spon-
dius Cytherea, the Pa/ndcmus adoratissimus, the
paper-mulberry and others. In the interior of the

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 187

island grow mimosas, gigantic bamboos and palms.
On the slopes of the mountains grow in rare perfec-
tion those huge tree-ferns, so much sought after by
botanists. The greater part of our European veg-
etables have succeeded there — even the culture of the
vine has been attempted and grapes have been pro-
duced. Vanilla grows in perfection, and coffee and
the sugar-cane nourish so well that their export is
one of the chief commercial features, although in at-
tempting to raise these plants three serious difficulties
arise : the indolence of the natives, the excessive
price of labor, and a weed, called goyavier (guava-
tree), the roots of which are found everywhere. E~or
ought we to omit mentioning among these remarkable
trees peculiar to certain portions of our globe, the
mangroves, natives of Tropical America and India.
Long looked upon as strange hybrids, half tree, half
fish, living half plunged in the sea or the lagoons
near the coast, these trees (Rliizopliora gymnorrhisa)
send down little rootlets from their branches, all ready
to start a new growth as soon as they sink into the
mud which surrounds the mother plant. Thus they
form a new family group around the parent stem and
soon spread out into a vast, almost impenetrable for-
est, full of mysterious awe and exhaling a deadly
miasma.

The highest trees in the world are to be seen in
Van Dieman's Land. They are called in Australia
marsh-gum trees, divided into red, white and spotted
gums ; they belong to the genus Eucalyptus, repre-
sented in our country by the evergreen myrtle. The

188 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

dimensions of one of these trees are as follows : height,
300 feet (200 feet from the root to the first branch) ;
diameter at the base, 28 feet. The wood is so hard
that it cannot be worked with ordinary tools, and
nails cannot be driven into it.

Another gum-tree was 95 feet in circumference,
and three feet above the soil it would take 20 men
to encircle it with outstretched arms.

The quantity of wood yielded by one of these
trees is marvellous. The first we have mentioned
weighed not less than 1,540,758 Ibs.

These trees are the colossi of the vegetable
world. They are to the oak and linden as the
whale is to the elephant or the hippopotamus. They
owe their peculiar name to the enormous size of their
crowns, which are covered with dense green foliage.
This variety of balsamic vegetable yields a highly es-
teemed oil in immense quantities, a gum which is
sometimes eatable, and excellent wood for dyes as well
as for cabinet work. Even among the Eucalyptus
there is one species so large that it has obtained the
special epithet of the gigantic (Eucalyptus gigantea}.
They passed for the tallest in the world until recent
investigations in California resulted in the discovery
of trees still taller. Even the baobabs of which we
have spoken are exceeded in size by these California
monsters.

Of late the Eucalypti have furnished various ar-
ticles of commerce and become highly valuable. Their
hard wood serves for furniture, their twigs for walk-
ing sticks, of which thousands are annually imported

PITCHER-PLANT

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 191

from Algeria. But the most touching service they
render comes from their fragrant leaves. During the
Franco-German war they were largely used in hospi-
tals instead of lint, their balsamic nature not only
curing wounds, but after a few hours causing all un-
pleasant odors to cease.

THE GIANT TREES OF CALIFORNIA.

California appears to be the country of the greatest
vegetable wealth, as it is also the land where gold
most abounds. It is about 15 miles from what was
once French Gulch that we meet with the mammoth
trees, which there count up to about ninety in number.
In other places, and near the Yosemite Valley, hun-

Eagle Wing.

dreds have since been discovered. They rise straight
as columns to the height of about 320 feet, and
measure about a hundred feet in the circumference of
their foliage. The first branches strike off at about

192 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

100 feet above the ground. They are not numerous,
but the foliage is abundant at the top. One of the
most beautiful and perfect of these trees was felled
in 1855, and was carefully examined. From the re-
sults obtained, it appears that 4,000 years at least
must have passed before it could have attained the
proportions to which it had grown. Among the
trees felled at this time one, a giant among giants,
was found to be 450 feet high — higher than any ca-
thedral or monument in the world — and 120 feet in
circumference. In falling, this giant broke at 300
feet from the base, and even here it measured 18 feet
in diameter.

The forest in which these giants grow is called
Mammoth Grove. It is situated in a little valley near
the source of one of the tributaries of the river Cal-
averas. The valley which produces these trees con-
tains nearly 300 acres of ground, and lies about 4,000
feet above the level of the sea. During the summer
the climate is delicious here, free from the choking
heat of the lower plains. The vegetation is always
fresh and green, while the water, as pure as crystal, is
almost as cold as ice. The respective positions of
these trees has led to their receiving different names.
Of these the chief are the Man and the Woman, because
these two stand together ; Hercules, a felled tree
which yielded 72,500 feet of timber ; the Hermit, so
named because of its isolated position ; the Mother
and the Son, etc. These trees have all a circumference
of from 55 to 60 feet, and the height is in no case less
than 300 feet.

GIANT TREES OF CALIFORNIA.

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

195

Several of these trees are 1,-iOOor 1,500 years old.
One of them that was felled was so large that when
its bark was transported . to San Francisco, where it.
was put together again to be carried to Europe, it
was large enough to accommodate a numerous com-

Fallen Monarch.

pany, who put a piano inside, while twenty persons
were dancing on the floor, and fifty occupied seats to
witness the strange ball. The bark of one of these
giant trees was transported to London in parts, the
parts were set together again at the Crystal Palace,

196 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

and kept there till a few years ago a disastrous fire
destroyed the wing in which they had been placed.
Our illustration represents the largest of this class of
trees, which have been called the " Fathers of the
Forest." " This tree, also known under the name of
the mammoth tree, was found," says the botanist
Muller, " by Lobb, upon the Sierra Nevada, at a
height of 5,000 feet above the sea level, near the
sources of the Stanislaus and St. Anthony rivers. It
belongs to the family of the coniferse, and reaches an
average height of from 250 to 300 feet. Recent ob-
servations, however, inform us that it may attain a
height of 400 feet and upwards. The diameter of
its trunk at its base is from 12 to 31 feet. The bark,
which is 18 inches thick, is of the color of cinnamon,
and has on the inside a fibrous texture, while the
wood of the stem is reddish in color, but is soft and
bright." This reminds us that the wood of the bao-
bab also is by no means very hard, although it is one
of the most ancient trees in the world. 'About ninety
of these immense pines are to be seen within a circuit
of one mile. Usually they are grouped in twos and
threes upon a black soil well watered. Even the anx-
ious gold seekers have not been able to look upon
them with indifference, and have called one of them
the " Miner's Cabin." The stem of this tree is 300
feet high, and in it an excavation has been made 17
feet wide. The " Three Sisters " are a separate
growth from one and the same root. The " Family "
consists of two old and twenty-four young trees.
The " Riding School " is a great tree hollowed out

THE FATHER OF THE FOREST.

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 199

by time, the cavity of which may be entered on
horseback without inconvenience. It is astonishing
that vegetable wonders like these should have re-
mained unknown for so long a time ; the fact might

Pioneer Cabin.

warrant us in supposing that even more gigantic
trees may yet be discovered by men like Livingstone,
and his fearless brethren, in all parts of the globe.
We give in our illustration one of these gigantic

200 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

cedars ( Wellingtonia gigantea\ which was long con-
sidered the largest of large trees on earth.

It is a matter of extraordinary interest that these
giant pines of California, which were regarded with
awe by the aborigines, have caused one of the few
superstitious to crop up which are found among Amer-
icans. The gold miners of that region, we are
told, sometimes tip a cone with the first gold they
find, and preserve and sometimes even wear it on
their person as an ornament, hoping that it will bring
them luck. The curious belief has probably been im
ported by some of the German miners, in whose
homes superstitions connected with fir and pine are as
abundant as the crop of pine cones themselves.

THE MANDRAGORA OR MANDRAKE.

Country people can still recall the fright which the
simple name of this plant used to produce among
our ancestors. It was a vegetable, but seemed also,

The Mandrake

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 201

by some mysterious association, to be something of a
human being ; and the works written on magic in the
middle ages, numerous and implicitly believed as they
were, ascribed to it a supernatural power. Pliny men-
tions it fully, though Theophrastes calls it first An-
thropomorphosis / Columella speaks of it as the " half
man (semi-homo)', Eldal as the " man-headed-tree," and
popular traditions all over the world, as the " little-man
tree," etc. Its root is certainly a striking likeness of
a headless man walking rapidly on footless stumps ;
indeed, much more like a man than any thing the an-
cient Mexicans have graven on their monuments, or
our Indians write upon the leaves of their birch-bark
mystery books. It was a principal ingredient in the
composition of philtres, potions, and "charms intended
for evil purposes, and to cure barrenness. It is well
known that the Septuaginta gave the name of man-
drake to the plant dudaim, found by Reuben (Gene-
sis, ch. xxx.), while Luther arbitrarily changed it into
simple "lilies."

The man who found the precious root was deemed
happy, since it gave him power to excite love where-
ever he chose, and exercised a divine influence upon
his destinies ; but its extraction-was protected by weird,
magic forms. When the little man-plant was up-
rooted, it gave forth groans ; it had to be gathered
under a gibbet, observing particular rites, and even
when gathered according to rule, displayed its won-
derful powers only under certain conditions. The
best method, Josephurahead teaches, was to get a dog
to uproot it, who paid with his life for his boldness ;

202 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

and then carefully wrap it in a winding sheet. Mar-
vellous virtues were ascribed to it, not the least of
which were, that it doubled the prices of money
around which it was wrapped ; while the Arabs still
call it the " DemVs apple" from its power to excite
voluptuous feeling.

This plant belongs to the family of the Solonce,
and its scientific name is Atropa mandragora.
tit is a poisonous plant, and grows in dark wood by
river banks ; and in those mysterious localities not-
often visited by the rays of the sun. The root is
thick and long, whitish in color, and generally forked
like the legs of a man. Oval leaves crown the
root and spread all around, hanging downwards.
Its white flowers are tinged with purple ; its fruit,
which resembles a small apple, has, like the whole
plant, a fetid odor. It is principally the bifurca-
tion of the root which makes the plant look a little
like a human body. Another plant used for the same
purpose, as mentioned by Schleiden, is a bulb (Alr
lium victoriaUs, to which similar powers are as-
cribed.

In the same class with the mandragora, we must
mention the ginseng of Tartary, discovered in 1616,
by Father Lah'tau, and presented by him to the
Duke of Orleans — the Regent of France. He relates
his discovery in the following words :

" Having spent nearly three months in vain search
for the ginseng, chance showed it me when I least
expected to find it. It was then in its maturity, and
the red color of its fruit attracted my attention. I at

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 205

once suspected that this must be the plant I was look-
ing for. Having carefully uprooted it, I carried it
full of joy to a native woman whom I had employed
in searching for it elsewhere. She recognized it at
once as one of the simple remedies made use of in the
country, and explained to me on the spot its nature.
When I told her of the use made of this plant in Chi-
na, this woman cured herself on the following day of
an intermittent fever that had plagued her for several
months. The preparation was simply a drink of the
cold water, in which a few roots of the plant had been
steeped after having been previously bruised between
two stones. She resorted twice again to this remedy
for the same complaint, and on each occasion she was
cured within twenty-four hours.

" My surprise was great when, upon hearing that
the Chinese name meant Likeness to Man, or, as the
translator of Father Kircher's work states it — men's
legs, I found that the Iroquois word garentoguen had
the same meaning ! It signifies the two thighed, and
is by the Indians applied to the ginseng, the plant
which I had discovered in Canada and then again
known in China. Reflecting on the uncommonness
of the name, which seemed to rest entirely on the
very imperfect ^likeness to the human body borne
only occasionally by a few plants of this family while
it is met with in other plants of quite different spe-
cies, I could not convince myself that the same word
should have been applied to the same thing in China
and in Canada without some interchange of ideas
and without direct communication. Thus I was con-

206 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

firmed in the opinion I had long entertained, that
America had once been one and the same continent
with Asia, and that it was then united to Tartar y to
the north of China."

When I had discovered the ginseng it occurred to
me that it might be a variety of mandragora, and I
had the pleasure of seeing that in this I was borne
out by Father Martini, who says ; " I cannot better
describe this root than by saying that it is very like
our mandragora, though a little smaller. It may be
one of the species of that plant. For myself, I have
not the slightest doubt that it has all the qualities and
the same virtues as that plant. In shape the two
plants are alike."

If Father Martini was right in calling the gin-
seng a variety of mandragora because of its shape, he
was entirely wrong in calling it so on account of its
properties. The European mandragora is narcotic,
cooling and stupefying. These qualities are not at
all found united in ginseng, yet Father Martini's ideas
made me pursue my researches still further. I soon
found out that the mandragora of to-day is not the
plant so called by the ancients ; and I believe that in
examining the matter more closely and comparing
ginseng with what the ancients called mandragora,
we should find that the plant I discovered in Canada
was the actual anthropomorphos of Pythagoras and
the mandragora of Theophrastes.

It is easy to imagine how the mandragora of the
ancients has been lost. In the first place it must
have been in great demand in early times on account

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 207

of its singular properties so highly esteemed by the
ancients. Secondly, the difficulty that this plant has
in multiplying itself would always make it rare.
The roots would be constantly pulled out before the
plants had come to maturity, and thus all chance of
propagation would be destroyed.

The mandragora of the ancients being lost, noth-
ing was more likely than that another plant should be
substituted for it, which had similar properties. Our
mandragoras have roots which bear some resemblance
to the human body, from the waist downwards ; the
seeds are white, and have the appearance of small kid-
neys ; and all these features are equally characteristic
of the ginseng.

It need hardly be added that the reverend father's
supposition has not been maintained by modern inves-
tigations. The ginseng of China, found abundantly
in the Middle States of the Union, and largely ex-
ported to the flowery kingdom, is an araliacious plant
belonging to the same class as our ivy. It is known
to botanists by the name of Panax Schinseng. The
plant found in Canada is an allied species (Pcmax
quinquefolium\ having a root like the ginseng of
China. It is exported to China and highly valued
there for its properties, which are however as fabulous
as those ascribed to the European mandrake. There
can be no doubt that the atropa mcmdragora is the
plant of the ancient Greek writers.

Nympheacse.

SECOND PART.
CHAPTER I.

FLOWERS:

A N attempt to describe marvellous flowers would
•~^- involve a description of the entire flora of the
globe ; for, in truth, whatever its form, its size, its color
may be, every flower is in itself a marvel of one kind or
another. In order to follow some practical plan, we
must first make a few general observations by way of
explaining the plan we mean to follow, and afterwards
we may choose some special types best suited to bring
out into relief certain special features of the floral
world.

The earth is a large garden sown with flowers,
which add a singular charm to the domain that has

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

been given to man. In their succession throughout
the year they provide for us a continuous festival with
ever-varying decorations that follow each other in
regular order. First come cowslips with us, snow-
drops in Europe, long before the trees dare to put
forth their leaves. Then comes the crocus, timidly
peeping forth because it has but little strength to re-
sist the strong winds ; and with it comes the violet,
loved by all, and the bright primrose. These and a
number of wild flowers form the advanced guard of
the army of flowers, and their appearance, attractive
in itself, is all the more delightful because it announces
to us the approach of a vast multitude of beautiful
companions.

After these the children of nature appear in regu-
lar order and each month brings with it its own
proper decorations. The tulip begins to show its
leaves and flowers ; soon the beautiful anemone will
spread out its purple-streaked petals ; and the ranun-
culus display its magnificence, charming the eye with
its harmoniously disposed colors. The crown impe-
rial and narcissus, lilac and lilies of the valley, iris
and jonquilles, decorate the flower bed. At the same
time the fruit-trees mingle their soft colors with the
fresh, bright green of the early grass ; and heighten
by contrast the beauty of our gardens.

At the same time the rose begins to show its
lea\ es and early buds, soon to claim the position of
queen in the w^orld of flowers. No one can resist the
charms which it unfolds to view. The heart must be
stony that can remain without emotion at the siht of

v>{" THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

a rose half opened in the rays of the morning sun ;
glittering with dew-drops ; and swaying gently upon
its slender branch as it is rocked to and fro by the
morning breeze !

Autumn in its turn brings its balsams and sun-
flowers, its tube-roses and chrysanthemums, its rich
carnations and brilliant colchicums, and a hundred
other varieties. Thus the glorious display continues
without interruption. Then comes sad winter with
its frosts, covering nature with a robe of snow, and
hiding it for a time from our sight ; but while making
us long for the returning verdure of spring, it is busy
with those processes of regeneration under ground
without which there could be no floral display in
summer.

Let us pause here, and with Louis Cousin, reflect
upon the wisdom and goodness shown by this varied
succession of flowers.

How beautiful their combination of colors ! How
diversified and how harmoniously are they blended !
What wonderful skill in the arrangement of these
tints ! There, the colors seem to have been put on
with a delicate hand ; here they are mingled accord-
ing to the most learned rules of art. The color of the
background appears always to be chosen in such a way
as to bring out the drawings traced upon it, so that
the green, which surrounds the flower, or the shadow,
which the leaves throw down, serves still further to
give new life to the whole.

" In the flower," writes Pouchet, " this glorious and
supreme effort of vegetable life, the poetic imagination

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. :»[j

of Linnseus beheld only the picture of a chaste mar-
riage. Plants which are ornamented with visible
ilowers exhibit an endless variety of size, form, color-
ing, and perfume. While some, such as the valerians,
bear such tiny corollas that we can scarcely make them
out, the lilies and irises exhibit grand and sumptuous
structures of this class, which rivet every person's atten-
tion ; and yet some exotic plants leave them far behind
in this respect.

The flower of one Aristolochia, which grows on
the banks of the Magdalena, presents the appearance
of a casque with great edges. The opening of it is so
large that it will admit the head of a man ; and Hum-'
boldt relates that, when travelling along by this river,
he sometimes encountered savages wearing this flower
on their heads like a hat.

But it is on the surface of rivers that the pomp of
vegetation is displayed. Nature nowhere shows
another flower which for size, united to coloring, can
be compared to those of the Nympheae and the Ne-
lumbia. By gentle gradation they pass from the
purest white to the most velvety red or the most
delicate blue ! In every age the magnificent plants
have attracted man's attention and been the object of
his admiration. Art has made a splendid use of them ;
and to them the ancient myths owe some of their
most delicate and beautiful conceptions.

They play a great part in mythology and on Egyp-
tian monuments. The colonnades of Thebes and
Philoe, which seem to defy the hand of time, are
crowned with capitals representing flowers of the

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

Nymphese in full bloom, with which the sculptors of
the Pharaohs have sometimes intermingled bunches
of dates.

There is no Egyptian monument on which Iris
is not represented surrounded by the lotus, or holding
bouquets of it in her hand. This flower was the in-
dispensable ornament of the immortal goddess. In
the Hindoo temples it also serves as a seat for Bramah,
who is represented sitting and holding in his hands
the sacred Yedas.

Poetry has exhausted all its resources in telling of
the perfume and color of flowers. Nature has sur-
passed art, and the pencil of Apelles and Reubens
could not reproduce them in all their magnificence.
And yet one color, black, is wanting amid this multi-
tude of varied tints. Some corollas, such as those of
certain Scabiosse, are, it is true, of a sombre purple,
but a perfect black is never seen in this organ.

One phenomenon occurs in respect to the coloring
of flowers which has been a good deal talked about ;
it is the mutability of it. Pallas, when exploring the
banks of the Yolga, remarked with astonishment that
a species of anemone, the anemone patens, sometimes
bore white flowers, sometimes yellow, and sometimes
red flowers. This phenomenon, still unexplained,
appeared so abnormal that it was mentioned every-
where. It is, however, common enough ; and we may
observe it any time in France without encountering
such a long journey.

The field pimpernel (Anagallis arvensis), so com-
mon in our country districts, frequently displays this

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 213

change. Usually its flower is of a vermilion red, but
it is also sometimes of a magnificent sky blue, which
made some botanists think they were two different
species.

A pretty little plant of the genus Myosotis, which
is met with in our arid grounds, varies still more sin-
gularly in its color, for on the same stalk we find at
the same time red, yellow, and blue flowers — a peculi-
arity to which this species owes the name of Myoso-
tis diversicolor which has been given it.

Other plants display a still more remarkable phe-
nomenon, for in them the same flower changes its
colors at different hours of the day. This happens
with the Hibiscus mutdbiliS) the corollas of which are
white in the morning, become rose-colored towards the
middle of the day, and in the evening take on a beau-
tiful red tint.

The successive change in the tints of the corolla
is easily conceived ; it may depend on vital action or
on chemical reactions affected by time ; but what is
much more difficult to explain is, that flowers having
displayed a certain category of changes during the
day, go through the same round of variation the day
following. This is observed in the variously colored
corn-flag (Gladiolus versicolor Linn.\ the corolla of
which, brown in the morning, becomes blue in the
evening, and on the day following takes on again ex-
actly the same succession of tints as it showed the day
before. What a variety of perfumes the flower pos-
sesses ! And yet notwithstanding their thousand and
one shades of difference, those whose sense of smell

THE WONDEKX or

is sharpened by practice can distinguish that of each
species.

It is even stated in some works that a young
American who had become absolutely blind, botan-
ized, guided by the smell only, in the midst of prairies
enamelled with luxuriant vegetation, and never com-
mitted any mistake in his Meanings.

Orchids.

CHAPTEE II.

ORCHIDS OR AIR-PLANTS.

IT is not to the caprices of amateurs alone that or-
chids owe their celebrity ; they justify the predilec-
tion with which they are regarded by their beauty
and their singularity, and even by the difficulties which
explorers have had to overcome in order to bring them
home from their intertropical forests, and by the care
and skill which horticulturists have had to employ in
acclimatizing them in northern climates.

In first speaking of their beauty and their singu-
larity, we find that these remarkable plants have cer-
tain features utterly unlike those of all other plants.
They live as parasites, either on the bark of large

t>lO THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

trees in equatorial forests — in which case they are
called epiphytes — or upon the soil, in which case they
are called terrestrial orchids. The first, by far the
most numerous, hang from the shady vaults of trop-
ical forests like graceful garlands of incomparable rich-
ness.

Here we are told they had adorned the brow of
royal Indian maidens, flourished in the palaces and
perfumed the luxurious air of Peruvian courts ; they
were the love-messengers of noble Mexican youths ;
they lay, a mournful tribute of affection, on the grave
of a departed friend, and hung their fantastic garlands
along the gold-glowing walls of Mexican temples.

" Under the tropics," says Humboldt, " the orchids
enliven the trunks of the trees which have been black-
ened by the rays of the sun and the cliffs of repulsive
rocks. The flowers of the orchids resemble sometimes
winged insects and sometimes the birds which the
perfume of their nectaries attract. The life of a paint-
er would be insufficient to represent the magnificent or-
chids that grow even within a small space in the deep
valleys of the Peruvian Andes."

Unlike any other parasites they enrich the tree on
which they grow. Flowers of brilliant colors, infinite-
ly diversified, decorate the upper branches of the trees
and give forth a perfume so sweet as to become ener-
vating. They grow downward, unlike other flowers,
and seem to be purely aerial beings, the roots even
finding their food in the atmosphere alone. The rich-
ness of their colors and perfume is such that not only
Europeans admire and appreciate them, but the pow-

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 217

er of their beauty is fully felt even by the savage na-
tives.

Another feature peculiar to these flowers, and not
less remarkable is, that like the country in which they
grow, they do not distinguish the difference between
the seasons and obey no regular law in their flowering.
They bloom apparently capriciously, and consequently
their flowers are seen and their perfume felt all the
year through. Besides, their bloom lasts two or three
times as long as that of ordinary flowers. The posses-
sor of a collection of orchids is thus certain to have some
plants in bloom all the year round. Of course they
have to be kept in a green-house, the heat of which
is uniform throughout the year, and even besides this
they call for unremitting, intelligent, and minute care
in a greater degree than most plants.

The orchid which our illustration represents is an
acinctum, a plant recently introduced into France,
and very rare even in the most richly-furnished hot-
houses. The floral stem grows downwards, like that
of the stanhopsea and others ; the plant lives as a par-
asite upon trees and its flowers hang in low garlands
down the trunk.

These plants are still so rare in Europe, and with us,
that wealthy collectors have been known to pay fabu-
lous prices for certain varieties. It is needless to
state that these enthusiastic purchasers are mostly Eng-
lishmen. Perhaps the most notable among them was
the Duke of Devonshire, who some years ago, when
visiting the collection of Mr. Henderson, was greatly
struck with the beauty of one of his orchids. The duke

218 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

was accompanied by a young lady passionately fond of
flowers, and both were charmed beyond expression with
the orchid. But the collector could not be prevailed
upon to part with it ; it was unique in Europe and
was beyond price. He was not proof, however, against
the munificence of the duke, who placed a pocketbook
well filled with bank notes in the hands of the aston-
ished horticulturist and walked off in triumph with
his prize.

The terrestrial orchid is a native of Panama, and
a bulbous-looking plant. From the base of the tree
a pale green, almost white, articulate flower spike
shoots up and rises to the height of four or five feet, the
upper portion forming a raceme of pure white, waxy
flowers, sometimes as many as twenty in number.
Each flower, waxy and pure white, is nearly circular,
about two inches in diameter, and in the centre the
column pollen masses with erect wings are so beauti-
fully combined as to bear a remarkable resemblance
to a dove of purest wing, having the wings faintly
spotted with lilac. In its native land this Dove
Flower, as the English call it, is known as El Espir-
itu Santo, and regarded with superstitious reverence as
a religious symbol at which no one who has ever seen
the flower will feel the least surprise.

Its only rival is the famous Butterfly Flower (Onci-
drium papiteo) from the verdant island of Trinidad.
This is an epiphyte or true air-plant, growing on the
trunks or branches of trees, to which it attaches itself
with great firmness by a network of fibrous and thread-
like roots, but entirely nourished by the atmosphere.

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 219

The flowerstalks, four feet long, support at the end a
single flower, bearing a singular and striking resem-
blance to a butterfly on the wing, not only in general
outline, but in some of its details, both of form and col-
or. The centre of the flower seems a mimicry of
the body of the insect ; the sepals, long, narrow and
slightly curved, represent in a wonderful manner in
shape and position the antennae of the butterfly, while
the petals represent the wings, and the labellum or lip
the expanded body of the insect. The striking and
wonderful form of this flower, the brilliancy of its col-
or, the position at the end of a long, neutral-tinted elas-
ic, wire-like stem, when seen moving, we might al-
most say fluttering, like an insect, with every current
of air, remote and apparently unconnected with any
root or bulb, it requires no very vigorous exercise of
the imagination to believe it to be not a flower, but
a gayly-colored butterfly flitting among surrounding
leaves and flowers.

But their number is almost endless ; there is a
spider-orchis and a bee-orchis, an orchis like a fly,
one like a man, and another like a lizard. One is the
very image of a swan, with arched nejt and gently
elevated wings (Cynoches ventricosum), while another
(Cabaestum viride) opens a beautiful capote, with
bows and strings complete, just the thing for a well-
grown fairy on a summer's evening.

SCKOPHULARIN^E

This elegant flower is the Antirrhinum graccum,
and belongs to the family of the Scrophularineae

220 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION

(what villainous names for such pretty things). Few
plants rival it in beauty and airiness. It comes orig-
inally from the Morea, and it seems almost to be a
plant of the air, free from the weight and grossness
of the things of this earth. It blooms in summer, and
the flowers remain in full beauty for several weeks.
[The flowers, which are of a bright yellow, are very
numerous and grow in bunches, while the leaves, with
their graceful outlines, are alternated, and the steins are
'slender and beautifully interlaced with each other.

To this rich and varied order of plants belong a
number of charming small flowers which adorn our
gardens, and some of which are endowed with extraor-
dinary medical properties. Such are the SpudweU
Veronica, a bitter plant; the mullein, the hyssqp,
sharp and astringent, the fox glove, a poisonous plant
of wThich only the very smallest doses can be taken
with impunity, the cow wheat, the horse- wort, the pig-
wort and the paulownia, all of them flowers and trees
remarkable for their beauty and elegance. According
to their species the flowers are either solitary and sep-
arate or united together in cymes, clusters or spikes.

Besides the Antirrhinum graccum which we
have mentioned, there are other species not less worthy
of interest — these are the wolfs mouth (A. majus\ the
snap-dragon (A. aranteum), and the Antirrhinum au~
gustifolium-y with its long and slender leaves.

The Yuccas.

CHAPTER III.

YUCCAS.

beautiful plants, the palms of northern gar-
dens, are now among the number of the choicest
objects sought after by connoisseurs in horticulture.
They are natives of this continent — well called the
gorgeous wild lilies of America, and have only been
seen in Europe within late years. Among their
characteristic features are their leaves, which are in
their way almost as useful as those of the papyrus,
since they can be used for drawing and painting, as
well as paper itself. They are very thick, very fine
in texture and velvety, and serve for certain works of
art, and for making light ornaments, fancy baskets,
and artificial flowers.

222 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

The character of these plants recalls one of the
most eloquent pages of the journal of poor Margaret
Fuller, afterwards Marchioness D'Ossoli, in which she
exhibited that rare union of deep sentiment with a
conscientious study of nature. She is speaking of a
man to whom society is no longer open, and who,
like the illustrious prisoner of Fenestrella in the
touching story of Picciola, had given himself up en-
tirely to the study of nature, animals and plants.

" I had," said this person, " kept two specimens
of Yucca filamintosa during six or seven years with-
out their ever having come to nower I did not know
the flowers of this plant, and had no idei of the senti-
ments which they might call forth.

In the month of June last I discovered a bud
upon the plant that had the best exposure, and two
weeks afterward, the second plant, which stood more
in the shade, also began to bud. I iirigined I was
about to have an opportunity of examining the
blooming of the one after the other ; but no, the
most favored of the two waited for his companion,
and both of them bloomed together just at the time
of the full moon. This coincidence struck me at first
as uncommon, but when I saw the flowers by the
clear light of the moon, 1 comprehended it. This
plant is created for the moon, as the heliotrope is for
the sun. It is not acted upon by any other influence,
and does not unfold its beauties by any other light.
The first night that I saw it in flower I felt a special
delight, I might even say ecstasy. Many white
flowers show to the greatest advantage in broad

THE YUCCAS.

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 225

daylight. The lily, for example, with its thick, firm
petals of dead white, requires daylight to bring out
its full beauty; but the transparent petals of the
yucca, of a greenish white, and looking dull in broad
daylight, gleam with a silvery brightness in the
moonlight ; nor is it only the plant which does not
assume its true tint in the daytime, but the flower,
which like all bell-shaped flowers, is unable to close en-
tirely after it has once opened, contracts and nearly
shuts up at noon, and lets its tiny bells droop sadly.
The leaves, also, which at night seem vigorous and large,
and stand out boldly from the stem in the shape of a
fan, like the palm, appear languid and imperfectly
formed during the day. Their edges seem ragged
and unequal, as if nature, dissatisfied with her work,
had left them without bestowing the last and finishing
touches. On the day after the night on which my
yuccas first bloomed I could not understand my mis-
apprehension, for the flowers seemed to have lost all
their beauty. But on the second evening I returned
to the garden. There, in the soft light of the moon,
my precious flowers expanded more lovely than be-
fore. The stem rose up into the air, straight as an
arrow, all the flower bells grouped themselves around
it in the most graceful way, and the petals, more
transparent than crystal, shone with a softer light
than diamonds; the outlines were clearly defined,
and yet as airy as if they had been woven by
the light of the moon. The leaves, which had ap-
peared ragged during the day, seemed now bordered
with the finest gossamer fringes. I gazed at my
15

226 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

beautiful plant until my emotion became so strong
that I restrained it with difficulty. Then a thought
filled my soul. It was that this flower of the moon
was the most perfect symbol of beauty and of the
purity of woman.

I have since had frequent opportunities of study-
ing the yucca, and of ascertaining by frequent obser-
vations, the truth of what was revealed to me so poet-
ically, viz.: that this flower blooms only at the time
of the full moon, and that it veils its charms from the
bright eye of day and reveals them only to the di-
vine eye of the night."

Rafflesia Arnold!.

CHAPTER IV.

NYMPHEACLE. VICTORIA REGINA. RAFFLESIA ARNOLDI.

TVORBIGNY, the traveller, while travelling
•*-* through the Republic of Bolivia, at Corrien-
tes, was attracted by the flowers, leaves, and fruits,
of a gigantie plant which he found floating on the
water. This plant, one of the most beautiful in Amer-
ica, bears some resemblance to the water-lily, and
seems to belong to the family of the Nympheacce.
The reader, in order to obtain some idea of what it
is like, must imagine a vast extent of water covered
entirely with huge round leaves, floating on the sur-
face, measuring from three to six feet, with flowers
now yellow, now violet, and sometimes white, more
than a foot long, and diffusing a delicious perfume.

228 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

These flowers produce a spherical fruit, which,
when ripe, is as large as an average-sized cocoa-nut,
and full of round seeds, which are farinaceous. On
account of this nutritive character the Spaniards
have called the plant " water-maize," while patriotic
Englishmen, impressed with the beauty and rarity of
this colossal flower, have named it, in honor of their
sovereign, Victoria B-egina.

The Lotus is the sacred water-lily of the East,
which appears in the mythology of almost every Ori-
ental nation. In Egypt, where the flower reaches
its greatest beauty, it appears constantly as the throne
of Osiris, the god of day. In India, Vishnu was rep-
resented as a beautiful youth sleeping on a star-spot-
ted serpent and holding the lotus in his hand. One of
the holiest volumes of the Buddhists is entitled,
" The White Lotus of the Good Law," and Buddha
himself is always pictured bearing lotus flowers in
each hand. The Syrians regarded it as a symbol of
the cradle of Moses, found on the shores of the Nile
by Pharaoh's daughter, and wherever the story of
the deluge found its way the lotus was associated
with the ark.

Our own water-lily (Nymphcea), growing in ponds
and slow-flowing rivers, gives us at least a faint idea
of the form and beauty of the Victoria Regina ; but]
the South American plant is of gigantic proportions
compared with ours. The large disks of round leaves,
from five to six feet in diameter, are so many huge
dishes of perfume. The leafstalk is below in the cen-
tre. The leaves are smooth and green above, with a rim

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 33 \

about two inches high, like the edge of a sieve or a
large tray. On the under side they are reddish, and
divided into a great number of compartments by the
veins, which project, leaving between them triangu-
lar or quadrangular spaces, each filled with a certain
quantity of air by means of which the leaves are sup-
ported on the surface of the water. And so well do
they serve this purpose, that birds and insects of all
sizes may be seen walking upon these leaves or pur-
suing their prey across them as if they were on a sol-
id surface.

Scomburgk, who discovered this flower in Brit-
ish Guiana independently of the traveller to whom
we referred at the commencement of this chapter,
lingers with pleasure over the description of this beau-
tiful plant. The calyx consists of four leaves of a
brownish red outside and white inside, each six or
seven inches long and three inches wide. From these
leaves of the calyx a considerable number of petals
spread out in a circular and symmetrical form. These
are white at first but become darker first at the centre
and gradually turn to the color of the carnation. In
many respects it is very like our water-lily. The
petals, which are more than a hundred in number,
gradually assume the form of stamens as they approach
the central receptacle, which is fleshy, and bears
large and farinaceous seeds on the surface.

Our indigenous water-lily presents, in respect to
size, an appearance as worthy of attention as its exotic
relative. It is in its way as richly-furnished with
floral beauty as the Victoria. About seven o'clock in

232 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

the morning it gradually rises from the water, and at
midday it has attained a height of three inches above
the surface. At four o'clock in the afternoon it be-
gins to make its preparations for the night ; it shuts
itself up and returns gradually to its home in the
water, where it remains till to-morrow's sun draws it
to the surface once more.

In a memoir written by Ribaucourt we find some
curious observations upon the developement of the
leaves of this plant and on the prognostications which
they suggest. It was without doubt by means of sim-
ilar observations that Thales, in the ancient times, gave
a telling lesson to the inhabitants of Miletus. It had
been objected to his science that it was unproductive,
furnishing neither gold or silver. For an answer the
philosopher bought up in advance the whole product
of the olive-trees that grew around the town. He had
predicted that the crop would be very abundant, — the
result verified the prediction, and Thales found him-
self the sole possessor of all the olives of the neighbor-
hood. But content with proving thus that a philoso-
pher can make a fortune as well as another, he dis-
tributed the whole of his gains amoiig the merchants
of Miletus.

The leaf of the water-lily sprouts from the end
of its root early in autumn. It remains, however, very
small, and rolled up during this season and the winter
that follows ; but in the spring it begins to grow and
unfold itself as the season advances. Castel narrates
that walking with a friend in September, 1788, along
the shores of a lake abounding with water-lilies, he

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 233

was surprised to see that the leaves had already with-
drawn themselves under water, which they do not
generally do till about the end of October. From
this circumstance he augured that frost would soon
set in and that the winter would be long. The result
justified the prediction.

Certain vegetables are especially intended for the
ornamentation of different regions of the globe. The
NympheaccB, floating on the surface of fresh, calm
waters, charm the eyes of wayfarers and painters in
all parts of the world. In Europe and in our own
country there are white and yellow water-lilies ; Afri-
ca has varieties with blue flowers, and in the Indies
there are the Euryale and the Nelumbium.

Thus Egypt seems to have had its own peculiar
plant, the papyrus (Cyperus Papyrus), on the inner
bark of which they wrote. There are, it is true, vari-
ous opinions entertained on the precise plant which
furnished them with their paper ; but the majority of
naturalists incline to consider the paper-sedge the gen-
uine papyrus of the Egyptians.

In like manner other plants appear to have a
special affection for certain mountain tracts. Such
are the rhododendron, charming shrubs with ever-
green foliage, which adorn the middle regions of
shady slopes and which the traveller meets with ei-
ther in the old'world or in the northern portions of tho
new world, blooming at the height of from 3,000 to
6,000 feet, now on the precipices of the Faulhorn and
now on the enchanting banks of the Lago Maggiore.

The beautiful flowers of this evergreen remind

234 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

us instantly of mountains and lofty Alpine regions,
where snow-covered summits mingle with the white
clouds. For the rhododendron marks the zones
where the vegetation ceases and perpetual snow com-
mences ; hence it does not flourish in the warm plain,
and the Rhododendron ponticum cannot endure the
rays of the sun.

The largest of all known flowers is one discovered
in 1818, by Dr. Joseph Arnold, and described by Sir
Stamford Kaffles, then agent of the East India Com-
pany at Sumatra.

The first communication relative to this remarkable
flower was addressed to the Linnaean Society of Lon-
don, which immediately directed careful research to
be made upon the subject and published the interest-
ing results in its transactions.

This gigantic flower, surpassing all other par-
asites in size, was discovered during the first expedi-
tion of Sir Stamford into the interior of the province,
an expedition in which he was accompanied by Dr.
Arnold, member of the Linnsean Society, who would,
no doubt, have realized the high hopes entertained of
him had not death cut him off at the very beginning
of his career.

Of this event Sir Stamford says in a letter : — " I
am pained to have to report the death of Dr. Arnold.
I had hoped, instead of sending yen such sad news,
to give you an account of the discoveries made by this
youthful savant, and especially of the discovery of a
gigantic flower, the largest, without doubt, that has
ever been seen to the present day."

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 235

The following is an extract from a letter written
by Dr. Arnold himself:

" Arrived at Pulo Lebbar, on the banks of the river
Manna, I delighted in the anticipation of reporting to
you that I had discovered what is, possibly, the most
surprising prodigy that exists in the vegetable wc-rld.
I had gone aside for some little distance, when one of
my Malay servants ran up to me with astonishment,
marked on his features, and exclaimed : ' Come here,
sir, come and see a new flower — very large, magnifi-
cent, extraordinary.' I went to the place to which
the Malay directed me. "

And there to his astonishment he saw this colossus
of the floral world. He had it cut and carried to his
residence, where it was the astonishment of every one.
It was examined, studied and copied, and it was from
the sketch taken on that occasion that we give our il-
lustration of the Rafflesia Arnoldi.

The five magnificent petals that spring from the
centre are of a beautiful orange yellow ; in the centre
of the calyx, upon a dark violet ground, rises a huge
pistil, looking like a blaze in a bowl of punch.
This prodigious flower is a yard wide, the petals are
a foot in length, and stand at a distance of nearly a
foot from each other. The nectarine or honey-cup
looks large enough to contain a dozen pints, and the
weight of the whole thing is given at 15 pounds.

Nepenthe.

CHAPTEE Y.

THE NELUMBIUM. NEPENTHES.

A FTEB- the nympheacse we will speak of the ne-
-£*• lumbium, a class of magnificent herbaceous
plants of a general conformation closely resembling
the preceding, which grow in the fresh waters of
the warm regions of Asia and North America. The
flowers are very large and white, red or yellow in
color. Besides the interest that is felt in the Nelum-
~bium speciosum, the famous lotus of the ancients,
two species call for attention, the brilliant nelumbo
and the yellow nelumbo.

The flowers of the former are among the most
beautiful and the largest in the vegetable kingdom.

TEE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 237

They resemble magnolias, emit an odor of aniseseed
and grow upon long foot-stalks that raise them to the
surface of the water. They are found principally in
India and China, and are partly cultivated on account
of the veneration in which they are held by the in-
habitants of those countries. For the nelumbium is
looked upon as a sacred plant — the symbol of fertility
— and their divinities are represented as seated on its
leaves. A species of the yellow nelumbio, grows in
this country in South Carolina and Florida, but its
flowers are smaller and always of a pale yellow.

THE NEPENTHES.

What Homer calls the Nepenthe has been inter-
preted as an allegory by Plutarch and some of the an-
cient writers already, because the flower now known
by that name appears not to have been familiar to
the ancients. The poet is believed to have described,
under the form of a glorious flower, the charming
Queen of Sparta, who made her guests forget how time
passed, by her wondrous tale of love and adventure.
It is certain that neither Lamark nor Brongni, nor
Jussieu, have been able to class this plant among those
now known. One believed it might belong to the
orchids ; another compared it to the rafflesias ; a third
calls it a " plant of uncertain character ; " while still
others make of it, in despair, a special family, that of
the Nepenthees, represented in India by the Nepen-
thes distillatoria • in Madagascar by a special genus,
characterized by the leafy tufts of its cups ; in Cochin
China, by the Nepenthes phyllamphora ; and in

238 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

Java by the Nepenthes gymnamphora. The Cepha-
lotus is the Australian pitcher-plant, and exceedingly
curious and beautiful, being ornamented with stripes
of red and purple, while the Sarracenia, also called
the side-saddle plant, from a faint resemblance to a
lady's saddle, is quite common in this country and
abounds in the marshy regions of Virginia. All the
nepenthes are evergreen creepers, and in the tropics
climb up the trunks of trees to the height of thirty
feet. This habit, and the long dark green shining
leaves render the several kinds of nepenthes highly
ornamental ; but the curiously constructed and grace--
fully formed pitcher which hangs by a long slender
stalk to the end of each leaf, places them among the
most singular and attractive objects in nature. Draw-
ing their own water unaided from the wells of the
dewy night, they fasten down the lid to keep it
sweet and untainted by the wandering bedouins of
the air, to be ready, at call, for the master's sole use.
It is commonly believed among the Indians of the
mountains that if they cut off the little cups of a ne-
penthe, and empty out the contents, the day will not
pass without clouds gathering and rain falling ; hence,
when they have reason to fear rain, they take good
care not to touch this plant. On the other hand,
when continued drought makes them anxious for rain,
they hasten to turn over the cups or urns of the ne-
penthes. They hold this plant in high esteem, as being
one of the most precious to the traveller, although it
often happens that no nepenthes are found except
on the banks of rivers, the waters of which are prefer-

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 239

able to that of these vegetable cups in which tiny in-
sects are apt to deposit their eggs.

" The structure of the cups appeared at first per-
fectly inexplicable to botanists," says a correspondent
of the Magasin Pittoresque ; " for in no other plants
are actual tendrils found to develope themselves in
such singular manner." Dr. Hooker, the great Eng-
lish naturalist, however, soon ascertained by careful
observation the manner of its developement. The
leaf, as it first unfolds, presents a curious tendril or
cirrhus, extending beyond the extreme point of the
leaf. As this tendril lengthens, the small enlarge-
ment at the end increases, and the tendril, in the
mean time, gradually bends upwards at the point like
a hook ; the part thus bent continues to enlarge, the
substance of the stalk appearing to swell, until it at-
tains the size and form of a pitcher. The lid then
separates from the rim excepting at the upper and
outer side, where it remains more or less raised and
united, as by a hinge, to the pitcher. This pitcher,
being attached at its base to the slender, tendril-
like stalk, hangs suspended six inches or a foot from
the point of the leaf with which it is connected.
Forty or more pitchers sometimes hang around a sin-
gle plant. As the pitcher swells, and while the aper-
ture remains hermetically closed by the lids, a quan-
tity of pure, tasteless and colorless water collects in
the cavity, which, when the lid is raised, is generally
found at least one-third full of this infiltrated fluid.
In the J^afflesiana, the somewhat pear-shaped pitcher
is six inches deep and two or three inches in diame-

24:0

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

ter at the base ! The whole of the outside of pitcher
and lid is spotted with a rich, brownish-red or purple.
It is well known that similar modifications of the
leafstalk, and the leaf itself, occur in many other

Ice Plant.

plants also. Thus, in the water calthrop, which
forces its roots down into the mud but spreads its
graceful leaves over the surface of the water, the leaf-
stalks are seen swelling in the middle into a kind of

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 241

bladder, filled with air, which serves to sustain the
plant. The leaf-stalks of the orange expand into real
leaves, those of the mimosas often take the place of
actual leaves, which remain abortive ; and those of
other plants, such as cherry-trees and apricot-trees,
bear glands which correspond exactly to the cells
that line the interior of the cups.

In the marvellously beautiful ice-plant of the Ori

Pyralis of Viae.

242 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

ent (Mesembryanthemum crystallinum\ all the super-
ficial cells of the leaves are so excessively developed
that they look like so many small bags filled with
limpid waters ; hence the appearance of the plant,
which seems to be covered with drops of frozen wa-
ters and refreshes the eye in the midst of a dry and
dusty landscape.

In other plants the leaves seems to have a special
attraction for insects, which, leaving blossom and fruit
alike unharmed, are irresistibly attracted by a myste-
rious charm in the leaves. Legions descend upon the
unfortunate trees, among which the evergreen coni-
ferse alone harbor 400 species, all more or less hurt-
ful. One of these, the pyralis, destroys the leaves of
the vine and with them the life of the whole plant,
thus carrying despair to all the vine-growing regions
of Europe and our own country. For even in our own
vineyards the obnoxious insect has made its appear-
ance, and, so far, science and experience have been
alike unable to contend with the feeble and apparent-
ly insignificant moth.

THE OTJVIRANDRA FENESTKALIS.

In the conformation of its leaves this plant, a na-
tive of Madagascar, is not less remarkable than the pre-
ceding. Its leaves assume oddly enough the form
of windows, and hence the odd name the plant is
made to bear. The vascular network is left without
the diploe, which covers the leaves of all other plants
of this family. It is a vigorous plant, growing at a

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 243

depth of a foot or more under water; the root a
large, oblong fleshy tubercle, out of which come forth
cylindrical fibres. The leaves, which remain curious-
ly enough always beneath the surface, are pistillate,
elliptical, and pierced with innumerable holes in the
form of parallelograms, and very close to each other.
They consist exclusively of the elegant network of
nerves, and thus present the appearance of delicate lace
• — hence the plant is also known as the lace-leaf plant.
The color is bright green, and the whole leaf looks as
if composed of fine tendrils wrought after a most reg-
ular pattern so as to resemble a piece of bright green
lace or open needle-work. The flower-stalk, green and
cylindrical, is the only part of the plant which rises
above the surface and terminates at the top in two to
five finger-like spikes, consisting of small pink flow-
ers, exhaling a delicious fragrance. These and the
seeds develop under the influence of light and air,
which the leaves never seem to enjoy.

Among marvellous flowers we ought also to men-
tion the Yallisneria, the typical species of which is the
Yallisneria spiralis. The rivers of Southern Europe are
adorned with numerous specimens of this remarkable
plant, which was long looked upon as one of the most
extraordinary in the whole kingdom of Flora on ac-
count of the marvellous phenomena which it presents
at the time of flowering. The female flowers appear
floating on the surface, as if in anxious expectation of
others, which they are to fertilize. As if in obe-
dience to their call, the male flowers, borne upon a long
spiral stem, gradually rise from the bottom of the
16

244 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

pond, unrolling the long flower-stalk, turn after turn,
till they also reach the surface. Here they meet the
h'rst-comers ; they touch, and immediately begin to
retreat once more to their dark homes beneath the wa-
ters, where they ripen their seed and provide for new
generations.

We cannot very well leave this part* of our sub-
ject without turning our attention to a phenomenon
more general and more important than any to which
we have yet referred — that of the migration of plants.
Without this power of spreading abroad and actually
moving from place to place we could not enjoy the
richness of the natural carpet with which the earth is
covered.

The learned director of the Museum at Rouen, M.
Pouchet, shall be our guide here as well as in all
questions of general import which require the assist-
ance of a practical botanist. " Nothing," he says, " re-
veals to us more vividly the splendid resources of nature
than the facility with which she covers the whole sur-
face of the globe with vegetation and with life. This
is attained not merely by the wonderful fecundity
with which she endows plants, — she employs also the
most ingenious and varied processes for transporting
her fruits and seeds from one pole to another."

The vast number of seeds which certain plants
bear ensures their continual reproduction ; and upon
this point calculation leads occasionally to unexpect-
ed results. Hay lias counted 33,000 seeds upon one
stalk of poppy and 36,000 upon a single stem of the to-
bacco plant. Dodard sets down at even a higher figure

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 245

the number of seeds that can be gathered from an elm
— according to him this tree furnishes every year more
than 520,000 !

It is evident that if all these seeds attained devel-
opment, it would require only a few generations for
these plants to cover the whole surface of the globe.
"But a multitude of causes retard this threatened inva-
sion.

The fecundity of some mushrooms is still more ex-
traordinary. Fries has counted more than 10,000,000
spores upon a single individual of the Reticularia
Maxima. Other plants of the same family produce
a still greater number of possible successors — indeed
the abundance is so extraordinary that all the powers
of the human intellect do not enable us to compute
their actual number.

The majestic Arancaria of Patagonia bears at the
tips of its branches 20 or 30 fruits of one tree, and
each fruit contains about 300 kernels. Except by
scattered families of the savage natives who subsist
mainly on these fruits, the country is almost untrod-
den by man and left to itself, and hence the arancaria
has formed, according to the interesting account of
Dr. Peoppig, immense forests extending north and
south for over 800 miles.

On the other hand, such is the fecundity of some
of the gigantic Ly coper don gigantium, that micro-
scopic spores must be counted by millions of thou-
sands of millions. But although they are invisible to
the eye, each of these spores can produce a mush-
room which, in one night, may attain the size of a

246 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION,

large gourd ! And it may be said without exagger-
ation that if the seeds of this plant were dispersed by
a miracle over the globe, and were to spring up sim-
ultaneously, on the morrow the entire surface of
the earth would be covered with hideous mushrooms !

The atmosphere is, of course, the chief agent in the
dissemination of plants. A multitude of seeds have
been furnished with feathery plumes, or with mem-
braneous wings, for the sole purpose of enabling them
the more easily to be carried away upon its current.

For this purpose the light fruit of many plants is
surmounted by a plume of gossamer fibres, forming a
real parachute which rises upon the lightest breath of
the zephyr.

Borne away from the mother plant and mounting
on the wind by means of this balloon, like a tuft of
feathers, the seeds perform enormous voyages. The
gentlest breeze bears them from the lowly valley to
the highest mountain top ; and if a tempest arises the
frail parachute is whirled away by the storm, joins the
clouds on high, crosses oceans and effects its descent in
distant, unknown countries.

Other seeds, too heavy to be borne upon the
winds, and able to endure soaking, accomplish long
sea-voyages, and cross oceans by the aid of currents
and waves. Thus cocoas, protected by their woody
casing, and carried off by regular currents, pass from
the shores of the Seychelles to the coast of Malabar, a
distance of 1,200 miles. Astonished by this unex-
pected and mysterious phenomena, which is repeated
every year, the Indians, as we have seen, can only ex-

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 247

plain it by supposing that the trees which produce
these enormous fruits flourish in the unseen depths
of the ocean.

It is, however, to the action of fresh water — to the
currents of rivers and brooks that the most important
migration of plants are to be traced. If Pascal has
called rivers " roads that run," plants seem to have
discovered the fact before him. Borne on their flow-
ing waters, seeds frequently travel over great distances
and find new homes in remote lands. Even at home
land is continually washed awray from river banks or
shores and thrown up again elsewhere, full of tiny
seeds.

Animals also contribute largely to the dissemina-
tion of plants. Bees and other insects do much
planting ; marmots, dormice and hamsters provision
their underground dwellings with fruits, and a por-
tion of their commissariat, often forgotten and left
underground, germinate and develop at the return
of spring.

Other mammiferous animals assist in their dis-
semination by a still simpler process ; seeds mature
in their fleeces and are deposited by them here and
there in their peregrinations. Thus sheep are made
to disseminate the seeds of agrimony.

If birds consume an enormous quantity of seeds,
they are made useful, in return, by Providence, to as-
sist, energetically in scattering other seeds broad-
cast over the land which they inhabit. Thus, for in-
stance, thrushes, who feed upon the berries of the
mistletoe, have been made to disseminate those cele-

248 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

brated plants throughout France. Other birds by
the same means propagate in their turn a great
number of plants. Travellers tell us, that when the
Dutch had destroyed the nutmeg-trees in many of
their East Indian islands in order to enhance the val-
ue of their nutmeg plantations in Ceylon, a variety of
pigeons, which are particularly fond of these fruits,
soon repeopled the localities with nutmeg-trees almost
in every place where they had been apparently extir-
pated by the barbarism of the Netherlander.

Even man is forced by Nature to do duty as an
agent in disseminating plants. His vessels and cara-
vans, traversing oceans and deserts, carry unconscious-
ly seeds and plants and spread them abroad in new
countries which he thus prepares, in blind obedience
to higher powers, for his own future use.

NUTMEG TREE

Antirrhinum Graccum.

CHAPTEE VI.

THE SENSITIVE PLANT.

" Weak, with nice sense, the chaste mimosa stands ;
From each rude touch withdraws her timid hands ;
Oft, as light clouds o'erpass the summer-glade,
Alarmed, she trembles at the passing shade,
And .feels, alive through all her tender form,
The whispered murmurs of the gathering storm ;
Shuts her sweet eyelids to approaching night
And hails with freshened charm the rising light.
Veiled, with gay decency and modest pride,
Slow to the Mosque she moves, an Eastern hride ;
There her soft vows unceasing love record,
Queen of the bright seraglio of her lord.
So sinks or rises with the changeful hour
The liquid silver in its glassy tower.
So turns the needle to the pole it loves,
With fine vibrations quivering as it moves."

r]pHUS the poet Darwin sings, in his fanciful
•*• " Loves, of the Plants," the praise of the Sensitive
plant (Mimosa sensitiva and predica).

252 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

Every one is, of course, familiar with the singular
movement which the leaves of this plant show when
they are touched. At the gentlest contact, they shrink
back upon their supports ; these fall back upon the
common leaf-stalk, and the common leaf-stalk finally
upon the main stem. If the extremity of one of the little
leaflets be cut, the others close around it as if in sym-
pathy. The leaves of this plant are digitate, that is,
they are formed in rays branching oft' from a common
centre, like the fingers of a hand. The narrow,
straight leaves draw close to each other, as soon as
they are touched, till their upper sides meet. They
come together in the same way at nightfall, or when
a frost is sufficiently sharp to affect the plant. In
calm and warm weather, they are fully expanded;
but when the plant is shaken by the wind, all the
leaflets close simultaneously, and the leaf-stalks droop
together. Even a simple cloud passing over the face
of the sun, is sufticient to change their position
their expansion diminishing as light and heat de-
crease. Though closed, and apparently in a state of
sleep during the night, they shrink still more closely
together if any one touches them. At the junction
of the petiole with the stem, and of each leaflet with
the petiole, tiny glands are seen, which are the most
irritable points. To touch these glands with the
point of a pin, is enough to make the leaflet close.
If the shock is sharp, all the leaflets make in succes-
sion the same movement, and close two by two in
regular order. The whole leaf only begins to droop,
when all the little leaflets have closed up, as if the

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 253

main body could not fall asleep till all the members
have been overcome.

If a little drop of water is delicately put upon the
leaflet, De Candolle was not able to perceive any
movement ; but if a drop of sulphuric acid was sub-
stituted for water, the leaflets shrunk instantaneously,
and drooped. The irritation is not merely local ; as
we have said, it communicates itself from one part
to another. The power of contraction resides in the
tiny round cushions placed at the points of junction,
which form a kind of knee-joint spring, or hinge,
and allows the stem to bend and lie down.

Certain experiments would seem to prove that
these delicate plants can, to a certain extent, accustom
themselves to a measure of excitement. Desfontaine
observed this in carrying one of them in a cart. At
the first movement of the cart it closed its leaflets,
and all its leaves shrunk. But by degrees, as the
cart rolled on, the plant seemed to accustom itself to
its new condition ; its leaves rose once more, and its
leaflets unfolded. If the cart started again, after hav-
ing stopped awhile, the delicate plant felt the influ-
ence, as at first; but after some time it seemed to
recover once more from its fright, and showed again
all its beauty to the day. It is now, however, con-
sidered more probable that the sensitive plant loses its
strange sensitiveness from the continual irritation.
The power of closing its leaflets is for a time de-
stroyed by the repeated application of the external,
mechanical agent, and restored again only after the
plant has enjoyed some rest.

254 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

Other plants move when they are touched, but in
a less degree than the sensitive plant. Such are the
Dionea, the Oxalis sensitives, and the Onoclea sen-
sibilis.

From the time of Pliny we have been acquainted
with the fact of the sensitiveness of certain plants to
touch. This naturalist says, that in the environs of
Memphis, there was a plant like the acacia, the leaves
of which, arranged like plumes, shrunk when they
were touched and rose again after a time. This is
evidently a sensitive plant, though the precise species
is not known. Pliny, however, only quotes Theo-
phrastes.

PLANTS THAT MOVE SPONTANEOUSLY.
Desmodium Gyraus.

All created beings form after all but one great
family ; for it is the same spirit that ordained the crea-
tion of the whole universe; the same laws direct
them ; the same power sustains them ; and all the
children of our great mother Nature are brothers,
bound to each other by indissoluble ties. From the
mineral to the human being, the series rises by im-
perceptible degrees ; the same features belong at the
same time to all three kingdoms, minerals, plants and
animals, forming in truth, the most perfect unity that
can be conceived.

Among plants, those which in particular appear
to possess qualities belonging to the higher, the ani-
mal kingdom, are the sensitive plants, which exhibit
spontaneous motion, whether in the normal state of

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 255

the plant or from accidental causes. The leaves of
certain plants are endowed with a motion which may
be termed revolving, because it follows a regular
curve, and thus describes in the air a figure like a
cone. The tendrils of the bryony, and of our garden
cucumbers, are endowed with this perpetual motion,
the duration of which depends to some extent on the
temperature. These motions are not apparent, ex-
cept under close and minute examination. This is
not the case with the motions of the Desmodium
gyraus. In this plant the leaves consist of three
parts : a large terminal leaflet in the centre, and two
smaller ones, lateral, and springing from the base of
the former. Now, for the whole lifetime of the
plant, by day and by night, in wet or dry weather, in
the sun or in the shade, the lateral leaflets perform
incessant little jerks, not unlike those of the second-
hand of a watch ; one of these rises a little distance,
and at the same time the other sinks by as much ;
when the first sinks, the other rises, the motions
being thus alternate and regular. They are the more
rapid in proportion as heat and moisture in-
crease, and are most evident when the sun's rays
are striking upon the plant. In India, on the banks
of the Ganges, where the plant is in full vigor, it has
been observed that the leaflets perform sixty of these
jerks per minute, and furnish us thus, as it were, with
a genuine vegetable watch. The large leaf performs
similar movements, bat much more gently. This
plant was discovered in Bengal, by Mrs. Mouson, a
distinguished English botanist, who died during her

256 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

scientific travels. The Indians were found to observe
these motions with a sort of superstitious reverence,
and attach to the plants supernatural powers.

We said above that the motions of these plants
manifest themselves either in the normal state of the
plant, or in consequence of occasional and accidental
causes. The Desmodium is an example of the for-
mer ; an example of the latter is furnished by the

DIONAJE MUSOIPULA — Venus' s Fly-trap.

This singular plant seems to have received from
nature faculties far superior to those of other plants.
It opens its pink lobes, the springs are set, and woe
betide the insect that approaches incautiously. In-
stantly one of its leaves folds back upon the fly,
which in vain tries to escape from the treacherous
beauty ; another has in the same way caught a small
worm, it holds it fast and will not let it go. When
we look upon these caprices of nature, we can hardly
help being tempted to believe that she has given to
these plants some powers analogous to those which we
admire in animals. Like them, this plant has action,
life, spontaneous motion. We find it possessed, in
fact, of all that indicates purpose and will.

The first specimens of this plant were brought
from South Carolina to Europe by John Bartram, in
1788, for the plant is native of North America. It is
a pretty plant, bearing several elegant white flowers,
while the leaves spread out close to the ground and
terminate in two lobes joined to each other by a hinge,
and surrounded at their edges with prickles. These

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 257

lobes lie open, like the leaves of a book, and a liquid
resembling honey is spread lightly over the edges,
which attracts the unwary fly. Between the two
lobes, just where they join, there are three sharp bris-
tles, and as soon as a fly, or any other insect crawling
over the surface, happens to touch one of the bristles,
the irritability of the plant is excited, and the lobes,
suddenly closing, imprison the insect — like a rat in a
common gin. Its efforts to escape have only the ef-
fect of closing the curious trap more firmly. The
prison doors do not open until all movement ceases,
or in other words, till the insect is dead ; then the
lobes unfold and wait for another victim.

Another pitcher-plant, peculiar to the United
States, is the Darlingtonia (Calif arnica), growing on
the Sierra Nevada, at an altitude of 5,000 feet above the
sea. When fully grown it bears a most striking re-
semblance to the upraised head and body of an excit-
ed Cobra, with hood expanded, and preparing for a
spring. The head is at right angles with the verti-
cal, hollow body, and apparently presents no -open-
ing by which an insect could enter ; under the place
where the lower jaw would be, hang two large red-
dish appendages, like the " wattles" of a fowl. Flies
and insects of every kind are irresistibly attracted by
the large pitchers which this plant bears; they
alight on the red " wattles," and then fly upwards
into the tube ; owing to a sudden twist in the neck
of the pitcher, they are at once compelled to descend
the hollow body, and never return alive. The old
pitchers are generally full of dead flies, and as they

258 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

soon split and rot, the ground around the plants is
strewn with heaps of insects.

Thus we have here plants, bloodthirsty, cunning
in the capture of their prey, and destroying animal life
on a large scale. " What mysterious forces," exclaims
the naturalist, Pouchet, "govern the life of a
plant !" These beings, now so graceful, and now so
imposing in form, adorned with dazzling colors, filling
the air with the sweetest perfumes, are they left desti-
tute of the faculties granted to the lowest of animals ?
There are two views on this subject, botli equally
guilty of exaggeration. One has been pleased to over-
rate what they call the inner essence of plants : the
other is guilty of degrading it beyond measure.

The ancients were especially guilty of the first ex-
cess. Empedoclus did not hesitate to attribute to
plants the highest faculties ; and some of the successors
of the philosophers of Agrigentum have not stopped
here. The mysterious mandrake was considered by
them a being possessed of the most exquisite sensibil-
ity. At the least wound, the little-man plant was
supposed to give forth piteous groans. And those
who dared go in search of it preferred employing
ample precautions to withstand the dread it inspired,
and to escape from its malignant influence and harm.

Nor are the crude notions of credulous antiquity
unknown to our own day ; on the contrary, they have
often assumed a still more fantastic shape. Adanson,
bold philosopher as he was, distributed souls largely
among the plants ; one he thought was not sufficient
for each and so to each he gave several. Hedwig, a

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

profound botanist, Bonnet, who was more superficial,
and above all, Edward Smith, attributed to plants an
exquisite sensibility, and even the possession of most
delicate sensations.

These ideas have found in our day ardent defend-
ers in two of the most celebrated savants of studious
Germany, Yon Martins, and Theodore Fechner. These
men look upon plants as sentient beings, endowed
with individual souls, and the latter has carried his
enthusiasm so far as to form a kind of vegetable
psychology.

The genius of Descartes had succeeded in making
the masses believe that animals were nothing better
than simple automatons, wound up to perform a cer-
tain numbers of actions. Going still farther, other
naturalists, like the great Huler, the founder of vege-
table physiology, were disposed to look upon plants
as beings, subject to no other law but that of material
forces. But neither extreme finds nowadays favor
with men of science ; they do not look upon the chil-
dren of nature as mere machines, but they are as far
from believing that they possess souls. The phe-
nomena of plant life are still more or less an enigma ;
they cannot be ascribed to natural and chemical causes
only, and yet they can as little be traced back to the
power of a supreme and individual intellect. Only
one thing is certain : they are subject to a vital force
which controls all the springs of their existence •
where this vital force disappears, life is at an end, and
destruction inevitable.

All the savants, however, who have examined the
17

260 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

subject thoroughly, agree on this point, that plants
enjoy a life as active as that of most animals, and that
they show signs of more or less sensibility. Bichat,
in his magnificent work on Life and Death, admits
this without hesitation. .Numerous experiments prove,
beyond doubt, that there is evidently in plants a de-
gree of sensibility analogous to that of animals. Elec-
tricity affects them, and narcotics paralyze, or kill
them. If sensitive plants are watered with opium,
they are put to sleep like men. Prussic acid poisons
plants with as much rapidity as animals. Let us
throw aside the antiquated ideas respecting vegetable
life ; let us simply examine the phenomena, and we
must arrive at conclusions which are astonishing.

" Although the existence of nerves in plants may
be still doubtful," continues the same author, " yet it
is certain that the irritability manifested by sensitive
plants seems absolutely under the control of organs
which are analogous to those of animals, since they
are impressed in the same manner and by the same
agents as those of animals.

Among plants endowed with marvellous qualities,
one may be cited that has furnished powerful tools to
quacks and charlatans. It is the Anastaiica, or Res-
urrection Plant, commonly called the Hose of Jericho.
It is a truly marvellous sight to watch this plant, when
apparently dead and dry, assuming once more the
color of life as soon as the root is plunged into wa-
ter. Its buds swell with new life, the leaves of its
calyx open, the petals unfold, the flower-stalk grows
and the full-blown flowers are before us like the work

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 2P,1

of magic. The Rose of Jericho is not a rose, but has
been placed by Linnaeus in- the first order Siliculosa.
Its earliest mention, perhaps, is in Jesus Sirach, ch.
xxiv., and ever since it has been connected in popular
superstition with the Holy Land and the life of our
Saviour. It grows in the sandy regions of Arabia,
Egypt and Syria. The stem divides at the base and
bears spikes of pretty white flowers, which change
into round fruits ; when the latter are ripe, the leaves
fall, the branches grow hard and dry, ^nd fold inward
so as to form a kind of ball. In autumn it is uprooted
by the storms and carried towards the sea ; there it
is gathered and exported to Europe, where it is highly
prized on account of its hygrometric qualities. All
that is necessary is to place the end of its root into
water, and soon the plant is seen to begin a new life,
to develop its parts, and to unfold new roses before
the eye of the enraptured observer. When the wa-
ter is removed, the spectator sees the magical plant*
grow weak, close up its petals, and the leaves pass
through the last agonies of vegetable life and die.
In certain countries it is still believed that this mar-
vellous rose blooms every year on the day and at the
hour of the birth of our Saviour ; while pious pilgrims
to this day report finding it at every spot where
Mary and Joseph rested on their flight into Egypt.

The natives of Mexico attached the same marvel-
lous qualities to their Resurrection Plant, which is
also found in California, on the Pacific coast. It has
a more remarkable recuperative power than'any other
variety, and after drifting about for months,

262 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

and shrivelled, it requires only a few moments in a
cup of water to expand to its original form and re-
cover its color. Still another plant, a Euphorbia,
called Medusa-Head, blooms out in warm water, after
being apparently dead.

The Bindweed.

CHAPTEK YII.

THE SLEEP OF PLANTS.

WHE2T the shades of evening spread over gardens
and fields the plant sfold their timorous leaves,
as if feeling some premonition of the darkness and cold
that are approaching. We have seen how sensitive
plants close up their leaflets as soon_as the absence of
their beloved sun has made itself felt, or when they
are touched by a foreign substance. This habit, how-
ever, is not peculiar to these delicate plants only ; it
is a feature of a great many other plants, which in-
vert their leaves at night in a manner entirely dif-
ferent from their normal arrangement during the
day. Their appearance is so completely changed that

264: THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

it is often difficult to recognize them in their strange
disguise.

This condition is what Linnaeus, who discovered it
m Sweden, terms the sleep of the plants, although
this expression, borrowed from animal life, and ap-
plied to plants, does not mean the same thing as with
animals — a state of repose and flaccidity ; for during
the night, plants are as stiff and firm as they are dur-
ing the day. Linnaeus, in order to verify the differ-
ence in the condition of leaves during the day
and the night, used to deprive himself of sleep, for
several nights, and descend into his garden to exam-
( ine his plants. He soon discovered that it was the
absence of light only, and not the intensity of cold,
to which this phenomena was chiefly due ; and this
fact was of use to him in establishing upon better au-
thority than heretofore the connection that subsists
between light and the organization of plants. He
next carried some of them into green-houses, where
they were protected from all injurious influences, and
ascertained that even thus sheltered, the plants yielded
as submissively to the negative influence of darkness
as their companions in the open air. He also found
out that the difference between night and day is
much more keenly felt by young than by old plants ;
and constant observation proved to him that the ob-
ject of nature in establishing this difference, was to
provide for the early closing of the young and ten-
der leaves, which are more sensitive than those of
older growth to the influence of cold and the night
air.

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 265

The positions assumed by leaves during the night
depends much upon whether these leaves are simple or
compound ; in the latter, the difference is far more
distinctly marked. In the oxalis, with compound
leaves, the leaflets bend toward the common stalk,
and lean against it with their under surface, leaving
only their upper surface visible. Sweet peas and
common beans fold their leaves up, till one supports
the other ; while other plants roll theirs together, in
the shape of an ear trumpet.

The common chickweed (Stellaria medico) fur-
nishes a beautiful instance of the sleep of plants.
Every night the leaves approach each other in pairs,
so as to include between their upper surfaces the ten-
der rudiments of young shoots. But they are not
alone. If one were to walk in a botanic garden
after the setting of the sun, a great number of plants
would be found which present a different aspect dur-
ing the night from that which they present during
the day. In some the leaves are erect and cover the
stem, in others they hang down and cover the leaflets
with the under side ; while, in still others, they ap-
proach each other in such a manner as to form tiny
boats. In the mallows, with simple round leaves, the
form of the latter is convex or concave, according to
the hour of the day.

To what cause are these general phenomena due ?
They seem to be independent of the thermometric or
hydrometric condition of the air. De Candolle, fol-
lowing the example of Linnaeus, ascertained that
light was the most direct cause. He exposed plants

266 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

that closed their leaves at night to an artificial light,
little inferior in brilliancy to that of day. " When
I exposed these plants to light by night, and placed
them in obscurity by day," he says, " they opened
and closed their leaves at first without any fixed
rule ; but after a few days they adapted themselves to
the new condition of things, and accepted night for
day and day for night ; opening their leaves with reg-
ularity at night, which now brought them light, and
closing them during the daytime. When I exposed
them to continuous light, day and night, they had, as
in the ordinary state of things, alternate seasons of
sleeping and waking ; but these seasons were some-
what shorter than in nature. When I exposed them
to continual darkness, they also slept and remained
awake alternately, but the intervals were very irreg-
ular."

The natural inference from these facts is that this
tendency towards periodic motion is inherent in the
plants ; and that light, acting with different degrees of
intensity upon different species, is the chief cause of
it. It must be added, however, that other botanists
have failed to obtain the same results as Linnaeus and
De Candolle ; so that the question is not yet absolute-
ly decided. It is claimed by many naturalists, that
there exists a hidden bond which connects the life of
plants with the great luminary in the heavens.

CHAPTEK VIII.

THE FLORAL CLOCK.

flowers of the lovely nipplewort, the beauti-
ful water-lily, and the brilliant marigold, with a
great number of other plants, expand and close at
certain fixed hours. They mark the altitude of the
sun, and its inclination; and steadily following its
motion on high, by their own imitative changes on
earth, they indicate, with unerring accuracy, the course
of time. Having observed this remarkable fact,
Linnaeus contrived his famous floral clock. It con-
sisted of three divisions : a meteorological division,
containing flowers that open or close earlier or later,
according to the condition of the atmosphere, and
consequently indicate the state of the weather; a

268

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION,

tropical division, as he called it, consisting of plants
that open at sunrise, and close at sunset ; and a horo-
logical division, consisting of flowers that open and
close at fixed and invariable hours. It is this last di-
vision that forms specially the floral clock. The fol-
lowing twenty-four flowers open successively at differ-
ent hours of the day and night.

Midnight. . Large-flowered Cactus . "7 . Cactus grandiflorus.

1 o'clock. . Lapland Sow Thistle .... Sonchus Lapponicus.

2 o'clock. . Yellow Goats beard .... Tragopogon luteum.

3 o'clock. . Great Pieris Pieris magna.

4 o'clock. . Smooth Hawks beard .... Crepis teclorum.

5 o'clock. . Day Lily Hcmerocallis fulva.

6 o'clock. . Shrubby Hawkweed .... Hieracium fruticosum.

I o'clock. . Sow Thistle Sonchus oleraceus.

8 o'clock. . Mouse Ear Hieracium pilosella.

. Pimpernel, or Poor Man's Weath-
er glass Ai'ragallis arvensis.

9 o'clock. . Field Marigold Calendula- arvensis.

10 o'clock. . Neapolitan Mesembryanthemum Mesembryanthcmum Nea-

politanum.

II o'clock. . Lady Eleven o'clock .... Ornithogatum umbellatum.
Midday. . Ice Plant Mesembryanthemum crystal-

linum.

1 o'clock. . Proliferous Pink Dianthus prolifer.

2 o'clock. . Hawk- weed Hieracium.

3 o'clock. . Dandelion Leontodon Taraxacum.

4 o'clock. . Alyssum Alyssum alystrides.

5 o'clock. . Evening Primrose (Enothera biennis.

6 o'clock. . Geranium Geranium triste.

I o'clock. . Naked-stemmed Poppy . . . Papaver nudicaulis.

8 o'clock. . Erect Convolvulus Convolvulus rectrus.

9 o'clock. . Linnsean Convolvulus .... Convolvulus Linnaei.

10 o'clock. . Purple Ipomea Ipomea purpurea.

II o'clock. . Night-flowering Catch-fly . . Silene noctiflora.

Among the flowers that open at a fixed hour, sev-
eral do not open again after closing, as the Syrian
mallow ; others, like most composite flowers, open
again on the following day.

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 269

A great number of flowers open only at night.
Among the most remarkable of these is the large
flowered cactus (Cactus grandiflorus) or, night-
blooming cereus, originally from Jamaica and Vera
Cruz. Its magn ill cent flower expands and diffuses
a delicious perfume soon after sunset ; but it remains
open only a few hours, and before dawn breaks it has
closed. Generally it expands once more on the fol-
lowing evening, and this continues during several
days. For four years in succession a plant of this spe-
cies opened its flowers in a garden in the Faubourg
St. Antoine, on the 15th July at seven o'clock in
the evening, with unfailing regularity.

Among the flowers which open and diffuse their
perfume only at night we may mention the Arabian
jessamine, several species of the Oestrum cenothera,
the lychnis, several libnes, some geraniums, and a vari-
ety of gladiolus. The Belles de Nuit, our marvel
of Peru (Mirabilis Jalapa\ owe their French name to
this habit of not opening till evening in hot weather.

The African marigold opens constantly at seven
o'clock and remains open until four o'clock, if the
weather be fair. If it does not open, or if it close
before that hour, it is certain that rain wil] fall dur-
ing the day. In like manner the Siberian thistle
remains open all night, unless it is going to rain the
following day.

The flowers of the nymphsea or water-lily, close
and sink into the water precisely at sunset ; they rise
again to the surface and expand as soon as the sun
reappears. Pliny jnentions this fact : " It is re-

270 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

ported," he says, " that in the Euphrates the iiowei
of the lotus plunges into the water at night, remain
ing there till midnight, and to such a depth that it
cannot be reached with the hand. After midnight it
begins gradually to rise, and as the sun rises above the
horizon, the flower also rises above the water, ex-
pands, and raises itself some distance above the ele-
ment in which it grows." According to some writers,
this circumstance is the origin of the worship by the
Egyptians of the nymphsea lotus, which they consid-
ered sacred to the sun. Its flowers and fruit are often
to be seen engraven on Egyptian and Indian monu-
ments. The flower ornaments the head of Osiris;
Horns, or the sun, is likewise represented seated on
the flower of the lotus. Hancarville has proved it,
that they considered this flower an emblem of the
world as it rose from the waters of the deep.

In speaking of the floral clock, it may not be out
of place to give the calendar in which each month is
represented by its favorite flower.

January, Black Hellebore.

February, Daphne.

March, Alpine Soldaneila.

April, Wild Tulip.

May, Dropwort.

June, Red Poppy,

July, Centaury.

August, Scabiosa.

September, Alpine Cyclamen.

October, Chinese Hypericum.

November, Ximenisia.

December, Cluster Lopezia.

PAPYRUS.

The Flora of the Sea.

CHAPTER IX.

MARINE PLANT.

SALT water covers nearly two-thirds of the surface
of the globe. Is this immense extent destitute
of the wealth and beauty of life, while the earth is
endowed with such a wealth of animals and plants ?
The ancient naturalists were far from comprehending
all the abundance of life in the ocean. Linnseus,
even, speaking of marine plants, only mentions an in-
significant number.

Science, more advanced in our day, has sounded
the depths of the ocean, and in those dark regions has
found an exuberance of vegetable life not inferior to

272 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

that which the dry land presents. There is a world
of its own, beneath the waves, and the classifications of
land plants does not apply to those of the watery
world. The sea-bottom is laid out in mountains and
valleys, covered with a magnificent vegetation, in the
midst of which a thousand animal forms are sport-
ing— forests that shelter guests more numerous and
not less varied than those of our more familiar for-
ests on terra firma.

It is our duty, however, to state that if there are
incomparably more animals in the water than on the
earth, vegetable life is not so extensively represented
in the former ; but there is this compensation, that
in the ocean there is still another class of creatures,
which are at once animals and vegetables.

Yes, the sea is a new world, the rich and varied
productions of which will hereafter form a most mar-
vellous section of Natural History. The posthumous
work of Moquiii Tandon (The World of the Sea.
London : Cassel, Fetter & Galpin), has revealed the
importance of this hidden world, and contains, as in
one casket, all the pearls concealed beneath the waves.
Let us hear what the great German botanist, Schlei-
den, says about submarine plants : " The submarine
flora consists almost exclusively of algae or sea-wrack.
These plants present such a diversity of forms tLac
a promenade at the bottom of the sea would not be
less interesting or less varied than a journey in the
Tropics. Their peculiar structure, soft and gelatinous
in all its parts, a collection of organs round, elongated
or flat, which do not deserve the name of trunks and

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 273

leaves ; tlieir brilliant colors, green, olive, yellow^
rose and purple, and sometimes combined in the most
extraordinary way in the same plant, give to these
vegetables a strange and fairy-like character."

" The plants of the ocean," says a French writer,
" do not much resemble those which adorn our woods
and valleys. In the first place, they have no roots.
Those that float are globular or egg-shaped, tubular
or membraneous, but show no signs of root ; those
that are stationary are fixed by a sort of gummy, super-
ficial matter, more or less lobed and divided. The
*£arth counts for nothing in their development, for
their origin is always independent of it. Every thing
takes place in the water — from it comes every thing —
to it every thing returns." — (Quatrefages.)

Terrestrial plants choose particular localities and
flourish only in certain soils. Marine plants are in-
different as to what rock they attach themselves,
whether it be calcareous or granite, to them it is all
the same. They grow indiscriminately anywhere —
even on corals or shells. They have neither real
stems nor real leaves ; they spread out in wide or
narrow layers, in one or many pieces, which supply
the place of these organs. They sometimes resemble
waving ropes, and at other times crisp threads. Some
of them might be taken for little transparent balloons,
for cakes of trembling jelly, for tanned hides, or for
fans of green paper. Their surface is sometimes soft,
polished,luminous, at other times covered with papillge,
warts or real hairs. Their color is dark or olive, yel-
low dark brown, dark or bright green, pink, or more
18

274 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

or less vivid carmine. Some writers divide them
according to their color into three great sections ; the
brown or black, the green and the red. The first,
found always at some depth, are by far the most nu-
merous, and constitute the greatest part of subma-
rine forests.

The green plants are superficial, and often floating.
The red plants are generally found in shallow places
and attached to rocks near the shore.

Islands of weeds of immense extent, floating on
the surface and sometimes carried by currents to pro-
digious distances, are ofteH met with by voyagers.
Columbus encountered one on his first voyage to
America. These are formed of sea-wrack. But at
the bottom of the ccean are rich fields of tufted plants
and of shrubs, where the fish, the bird of the sea,
builds his water nest, groves and gardens where
the inhabitants of the ocean sport, woods and forests
which afford hiding-places for the timid, unarmed
denizens of the sea to escape from the assaults of the
monsters of the deep.

One fact worthy of remark is, that submarine,
like terrestrial plants, attach themselves to certain
geographical limits. When wre consider that these
conditions of vegetable distribution are heat and
moisture, and remember that at a relatively inconsid-
erable depth the sea in all parts has the same degree
of heat, we will be astonished to find so many varieties
in the submarine flora in regions that are contiguous.
It may be said, however, that the algae display the
greatest exuberance in temperate zones, diminishing

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 275

in this respect as we approach either the poles or the
equator.

But at the bottom of the sea vegetation is richest
under the equator. " Let us leave," says Schleiden,
" the aquatic forest of the north and their gigantic
plants, some of which, as the pear-bearing algse (mac-
rocystis pyrifera) are from 500 to 1,500 feet long,
and turn to the regions where the sun is more power-
ful, to see if we find here the same profusion of vege-
tation. Let us plunge into the limpid crystal of the
Indian Ocean, and immediately before our eyes will
be displayed the most enchanting, the most marvel-
lous spectacle. Massive trees with singular branches
bear living flowers. Large and compact meandrines
and astrese form a strange contrast with their jointed
arms covered with finger-like branches. The colors sur-
pass description. The freshest green alternates with
brown or yellow ; deep purple tints blend with bright
red, pale brown and the deepest blue. Some milli-
pores, of a bright red, yellow or peach color, cover the
withered masses and are themselves covered with
beautiful pearl-colored retipores, resembling the most
exquisite carvings in ivory. By their side delicate
fans wave to and fro, the light yellow gorgonir,
and the pure sand of the bottom is marked with stars
and extraordinary forms of the most varied colors.
Around the flowers of the coral, little fishes, reflecting
a metallic sheen in red and blue, the humming-birds
of the sea, sport like the spirits of the abyss, and
medusae steer their huge, milky white, or light blue
bells across the enchanted region. Isabelles (Holocan-

276 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

thes ciliaris) and coquettes (Lepidopus argyreus) and
a thousand silvery fishes, displaying the most glorious
colors, abound everywhere and mingle with each
other in the most wonderful manner, until a slight
breeze springs up, then the mirror is broken and the
enchanting scene disappears as if by magic.

At night the astonishing scene opens once more,
but with the addition of strange phosphorescent illu-
minations and with still more dazzling colors. Mil-
lions of star-like medusae and microscopic shell -fish
dance up and dowTnin the faint darkness like fire-flies.
Further on the magnificent Sea Pen (VeretiUum
cynomorium) waves about in a magic light, fairer
than her brilliant red in daylight, and everywhere
sparks flit across the waters, fires blaze up and softer
lights are diffused. What in the light of the sun
looked brown and plain, now assumes all the tints of
the rainbow, and, as if to fill up the measure of all
that is grand and glorious in the dark deep, a gigantic
moon ti&\(0rthagoriscus mola) passes by like a huge
disk of molten silver, surrounded by thousands' of
sparkling stars. We will add but one feature. The
solitary traveller who has examined the wonderful
coasts of Ceylon, returned one evening richly laden
with treasures to his dwelling. " All at once in the
middle of the quiet night, lighted by the silver bright-
ness of the moon, a sweet music, like the wild har-
mony of JEolian harps, struck the ear. These mel-
ancholy sounds, sufficiently loud to drown the break-
ers, came from the shore close by and recalled the
songs of the Syrens. The music was caused by the

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 277

singing muscles, which chant a sweet and plaintive
melody from the coast." — Athen^um, 1848, No. 1089.
If we complete this panorama by a picture of the
watery world of plants, where there is neither leaf
nor calyx, nor corollas, and of the animals dwelling
there, rich in colors like flowers and shining like stars ;
if we consider the ever-changing mutability of the
bottom of the sea, which by turn overflows and again
abandons the continents of the world, we shall be
able to form some idea of the power, the importance
and the wealth of this element, which the eloquent
poetry of the East has apostrophized as the first and
eternal source of all things.

Forest of the Carboniferous Period.

CHAPTEE X.

PLANTS OF PRIMITIVE TIMES.

vegetable carpet which in our times embel-
lishes the surface of the terrestrial globe and
yields fruits and flowers, has not always existed under
the form in which it presents itself to us now. There
was a time when the aspect of vegetation was essen-
tially different, and the happy man to whom it might
be given to survey the two vegetable systems of primi-
tive and present times would be called upon to ad-
mire two worlds very different in their conditions
of existence. In the primitive time of which we
speak, no tree, bush, or flower, at present existing, was
to be found on the face of the earth. The world
presented a spectacle in every way different from ours.
There were, it is true, dense forests with shady

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 279

foliage, silent retreats and grand avenues, as at pres-
ent ; the wind sang among the branches ; the rays of
the sun fell upon the morning and the evening mists,
and the whole of nature was full of life and move-
ment. But there was no human being to contem-
plate these glories, to listen to these harmonies. It
is doubtful if the first representatives of animal life
had yet awakened into life in the depth of the ocean
or by the marshy banks of the rivers. Plants held
universal dominion ; the earth was a " vegetable king-
dom " — and nothing more.

It would be a mistake to fancy that this primitive
vegetation consisted of plants larger, stronger and
more beautiful than those that clothed the earth
when the reign of man began, and it would be an
equal mistake to imagine that those ancient plants
were as rich and luxuriant as those we see around us.
At the time of the coal formation of which we speak,
probably not a single fruit or flower had yet appear-
ed upon the earth ; and as to the supposed colossal
size of these plants, let us see in what this compara-
tive superiority consisted.

The beautiful trees we have described, the giants
of California, the monstrous baobabs, the elegant
palms, the gigantic oaks, and the brilliant and odor-
ous flowers of our own day had not yet emerged from
the mysterious birth-place of beings. The earth
hitherto had only seen plants of great simplicity and
poverty of form. The plants have at the present day
but a few rare representatives, which are not apt to be
noticed by the side of richer modern forms. Every

280 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION.

one knows our marsh-plants, horse-tails and other
reeds, consisting of a single stem, cylindrical, hollow,
worthless and uninteresting ; our lycopodiums or club-
mosses, our ferns, and all the host of modest, unsightly
cryptogams — these are the descendants in modern
times of the plants of the era of the first coal forma-
tion. For the number of vegetable productions,
however, this period, the period of transition from the
primitive to the secondary epoch, is far superior to all
others ; and to this amazing fertility we owe the un-
measured extent of the valuable coal fields which are
to supply our race for ages in Europe and America.
Instead of rising to the height of only one foot,
these " horse-tails," etc., rose then to the height of
40 to 50 feet, and the degenerate club-moss (Lycopo-
dium), which now reaches rarely three feet, grew in
primitive ages to a height of 90 feet. In those
ancient forests club-mosses had the proportions of
stately trees. Mushrooms sometimes attained 40 feet
in diameter, and tree-ferns, such as shown in our illus-
tration, rose uniformly to a height of 30 feet at least.
But imagination would go greatly astray if it fancied
that in like manner our oaks measured then 200 feet,
our pines 400 feet, our elms 60 feet in diameter, etc.
" The young earth," says Zimmerman, " expended all
its strength in developing reeds and brakes, mosses and
mushrooms, and while we find mosses equal to trees,
and perhaps mushrooms as big as mountains, there
did not exist a single tree in those days larger than
those of our own times."

But although at that period the whole surface of

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 281

the earth was covered with vegetation, these few spe-
cies had a very monotonous appearance. The modern
naturalist who could behold the earth as it then was,
would be struck by the vast expanse of forests which
covered the earth wherever the water had receded,
but also by the melancholy uniformity of the trees
forming these interminable woods and the absence of
all life. Not only were there only a few of the 200,000
species in existence which we now admire in their
matchless variety of form and color, but the diversity
produced by climate, from the tropical heat near the
equator to the eternal ice of the Polar Sea, was want-
ing, since climate itself was as yet an unknown feature
of our globe. The heat of the sun had little effect
by the side of the intense heat of the earth itself.
Hence, even now the fossils of animal as well as vege-
table life of those days are invariably the same,
whether they are found in the Arctic Zone or in the
Tropics. One vast uniform forest literally covered
the whole globe. The heat at the poles, drawing its
power from the internal heat of our earth, was then
at least equal to the highest temperature now known
in the Torrid Zone.

Besides the. simple horse-tails and ferns, of which
the humble representatives surviving in our day
give us a better idea than any design could do,
the primitive world possessed a few equally simple
varieties of plants, which have since entirely disap-
peared from the surface of the earth. Zimmerman
assures us that there are no plants now in existence
like those extinct vegetables.

282 THE WONDERS OF VEGEGAOION.

But all these plants have been found in a petrified
state in the rocks of the coal formation. There they
are preserved for us in the most wonderful museum
in the world. It is astonishing sometimes to find
that the texture — the fibres and the pulp — have all
preserved their forms unaltered, though the substance
itself has entirely disappeared. The Town Hall of
Nordhausen, in Germany, contains a staircase of
sandstone, each fragment of which clearly indicates
that it has been originally of wood. But no example
is so remarkable as the forest of petrified trees which
Sir James Ross visited in Yan Dieman's Land, al-
though it must be borne in mind that this forest be-
longs not to the first coal measures, but to the series
of Tertiary strata.

" One of the most marvellous natural curiosities,"
says this traveller, " which attract geologists to Yan
Dieman's Land, is the valley of petrified trees, a great
number of which are transformed into the most beau-
tiful opal. While the exterior presents a bright, homo-
geneous surface, like a pine stripped of its bark,
the interior consists of concentric layers, which ap-
pear perfectly compact and of the same nature, but
which can be easily split up in the direction of their
length. These trees are standing upright, and it
would seem that they were in full growth when the
burning lava overwhelmed them. Some fragments
of this wood have been carefully examined, and look-
ed so full of life, so absolutely like wood, that only a
very careful examination brought the conviction that
they were really stone."

THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 283
\

Coal was formed, as we know, by the prodigious
exuberance of primitive vegetation that covered
the whole earth. Every one has observed that in
damp cellars, in which dry wood is kept during win-
ter, there is a soft wood layer left behind, which re-
sembles vegetable mould ; and it is also well known
how our marsh-plants are gradually converted into
peat. In a similar but infinitely more powerful man-
ner was our early vegetation converted into coal.

At the time that the vegetable world was pre-
paring for man the fuel necessary for his industry, it
appears to have been called on to play an important
part in the economy of nature — that of purifying
for the good of the aerial creatures who afterwards
came to exist) the atmosphere which was surcharged
with carbonic acid gas. For though this gas is
of great importance to the growth of vegetables, it
is an obstacle to the existence of animals, and espe-
cially to the more perfect classes of animals, such
as mammals and birds. But when that ancient and
abundant vegetation fell and was closed over by the
earth, the carbon was no longer mingled with the air,
which gradually became purer and better suited to
the existence of animal life.

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