m
 
 . 
 
 /r / 
 
 LITTLE THINGS OF NATURE 
 
 CONSIDERED ESPECIALLY IN RELATION TO THE 
 
 DIYINE BENEVOLENCE 
 
 BY 
 
 LEO HARTLEY GRINDON, 
 
 AUTHOR OF "LIFE, ITS NATURE, VARIETIES, AND PHENOMENA, 
 " PHENOMENA OF PLANT LIFE," ETC. 
 
 SECOND EDITION", EE VISED. 
 
 BOSTON: 
 T. H. CARTER A.ISrD SO1S". 
 
 1866.
 
 Stereotyped and Printed by 
 
 ROCKWELL AND ROLLINS, 
 
 122 Washington Street, Boston.
 
 PREFACE 
 
 TO THE 
 
 SECOND LONDON EDITION. 
 
 THE following Papers make no claim to a scientific char- 
 acter. They are little more than brief notices of a few of 
 the phenomena of nature, given in a way that the least 
 experienced may understand. 
 
 The rapid sale of the first edition of -this work, and the 
 favor shown by the public towards " Life, its Nature, 
 Varieties, and Phenomena," and to the "British and 
 Garden Botany," have been sources of great satisfaction 
 to me. 
 
 85, RUSIFOKD STREET, MANCHESTER.
 
 Efje Uitalitg of 
 
 AMONG the most wonderful things in Nature are to be 
 reckoned the Eggs of Birds and of other creatures, and 
 the Seeds of Plants. An atom, often not so large as a 
 grain of sand, and apparently endowed with no greater 
 amount of living energy, expands, almost while we 
 watch, into a lively animal ; or it unfolds a green 
 point, which, nourished by the rain and sunshine, be- 
 comes the architect of a charming flower or a noble 
 tree. Did we not behold the miracle repeated inces- 
 santly before our eyes, it would be difficult to believe 
 that life could be so concentrated ; but, like all other 
 grand truths, it conies before us so much as a matter 
 of course, that we are apt to overlook its marvellous- 
 ness, bestowing our highest and foremost admiration 
 upon the brilliant and the sonorous, the lightning, 
 the awful roll of the cloud-born thunder, or the beau- 
 tiful upward-streaming glory of the Aurora. No doubt 
 these are things that deserve our deep and most rev- 
 erent interest, alike on account of their incomparable 
 grandeur as natural phenomena, and of their fine sig- 
 nificance as emblems of realities in the inner, invisible 
 world. We should, however, accustom ourselves to 
 1*
 
 6 THE LITTLE THINGS OF NATURE. 
 
 consider, with an equal delight, the common every-day 
 occurrences by which nature is sustained, and upon 
 which we depend for our personal and daily comfort. 
 
 It is a great mistake to suppose, that to find the 
 most striking illustrations of the Divine Love and 
 "Wisdom in the arrangements of the visible creation, 
 we are necessitated to look at what is immense and 
 magnificent. Just as the happiness of life does not 
 depend upon the half-dozen memorable enjoyments that 
 make certain years and days stand out in the annals of 
 our past, like the green and palmy islands of the desert 
 to the traveller, but upon the small and unconsidered 
 blessings that come fresh and fresh every hour and 
 every moment ; so does a truly intelligent idea of the 
 munificence, the skill, the taste, if such terms may 
 be used, also of the far-reaching providence that 
 anticipates every want before it can possibly be felt, 
 and of the ease and the infinite power of Him who 
 holds the heavens in his hands, come less of the consid- 
 eration of mighty phenomena that happen rarely, and 
 rather as exceptions, than of the daily observation of 
 that quiet and pretty ripple of life through the tiny 
 and tender forms of bee and butterfly, flower and fern, 
 and feathered moss, which imparts a kind of immor- 
 tality to the scenery amid which we tread, and makes 
 us cry out, with old Isaac Walton, as he listened to 
 the song of the nightingale, " O Lord ! if these be thy 
 gifts to thy creatures upon earth, what hast thou not 
 prepared for thy saints in heaven ! " 
 
 The preservation of the vital spark in Seeds, and its 
 sudden burst into vegetable fire when kindled under
 
 THE VITALITY OF SEEDS. 7 
 
 the laws that at once protect and call it forth, is exem- 
 plified as well as we could desire in the most ordinary 
 operations of horticulture. When the parent plant 
 decays, those little germs in which, with a loving fare- 
 well, it wraps up its best energies, along with incredible 
 capacity for bright color, and sweet smell, and grateful 
 taste, are collected by the gardener, carefully dried, 
 and put away ; every seed, he well knows, is a store- 
 house of sleeping life, which, with the return of Spring, 
 if placed where rain and sunshine can pay alternate 
 visits, will leap into green infancy of fair blossom or 
 wholesome vegetable. Nothing more is wanted to 
 prove the fact; but over and above this ordinary, 
 familiar proof, there is a class of occurrences less 
 known than they deserve to be, which are calculated to 
 excite our wonder to the utmost. Properly-ripened 
 seeds, if placed in certain conditions, are literally 
 immortal. That is to say, they are capable of retain- 
 ing their growing power indefinitely ; not merely for a 
 few years, not merely for a few centuries, but for thou- 
 sands of years, how long, indeed, no man can say. 
 The earthy crust of our planet appears to be stocked 
 in every part with seeds that have been produced in 
 years gone b} T , scattered upon the surface, and subse- 
 quently covered up with soil. "Whenever the ground is 
 disturbed, either by the plough, or by the spade of the 
 railway excavator, or for any purpose which causes its 
 depths to be overturned, that portion which was 
 many feet below being thrown to the surface, and ex- 
 posed to the air, the sunbeams, and the moisture of 
 dew and rain, immediately there springs up a crop of
 
 8 THE LITTLE THINGS OF NATURE. 
 
 young plants, certainly not originating in seeds only 
 just then brought from neighboring fields, and, as cer- 
 tainly, from seeds that have been lying in the soil for 
 ages. How they came to be covered up is easy to con- 
 ceive, when we see with our own eyes what is done by 
 wintry floods, and the sweeping down of great masses 
 of earth and soil, which accumulate often to a consid- 
 erable depth, and are no doubt similarly charged with 
 seeds, which, after waiting their turn, will some day 
 grow. For it is a clearly established fact that no seed 
 can germinate or begin to sprout, unless it have the 
 threefold influence in direct operation upon it, of 
 warmth, moisture, and the atmosphere. Let it be shut 
 in from the access of these, and it lies passive, giving 
 no sign of life or growth, and incapable of doing so. 
 
 How wonderful to think that this crust of the earth 
 upon which we daily walk so thoughtlessly, is at once 
 the cemetery of five or six thousand billions of men and 
 women, so far as regards their terrestrial bodies, they 
 themselves being all vigorously alive in another state, 
 and a storehouse of the germs of innumerable plants 
 and flowers ! What a provision in it for the perpetual 
 renewal of the earth's green carpet ! Let blight, or 
 locusts, or the cold grip of an inexorable frost, change 
 it to brown barrenness, the simple upheaval of a. few 
 feet of soil would soon furnish material for clothing it 
 anew. God never leaves himself without a witness. 
 The world is never so drowned but some little ark 
 swims upon the water's top with a treasury of new 
 blessedness ; and could we conceive it possible that 
 desolation should afflict the earth's surface, under the
 
 THE VITALITY OF SEEDS. 9 
 
 laws of natural calamity, we are assured that from the 
 granaries below there would soon flow an abundant 
 restoration. 
 
 Some persons hare tried to refer this wonderful cir- 
 cumstance of the immediate growth of plants upon 
 newly turned-up soil to an origin inconsistently called 
 " spontaneous generation," that is to say, development 
 out of earth, sand, and water, and any other odds and 
 ends of inanimate matter which might happen to be 
 collected together. No doubt, if it pleased the Al- 
 mighty to sow life afresh upon our planet, he could do 
 so. It may be in conformity with the laws of his Divine 
 Order so to do. But all that it has been permitted to 
 man to learn and think in reference to this subject, is 
 opposed to the idea of plants and animals ever now 
 arising except from seeds and eggs produced by previ- 
 ous individuals or pairs of the same species. We are 
 never justified in going to supernatural causes for the 
 explanation of occurrences which a calm and reverent 
 exploration will show to have their rise in natural 
 causes ; and no ground has ever yet been shown for 
 supposing that the plants which appear on railway 
 embankments and any similar places, cannot have orig- 
 inated in the way described. 
 
 True, there is a great deal that is very perplexing in 
 regard to the apparently spontaneous development of 
 some forms of living things, such as of grubs in flour 
 and bran. But the perplexity is the sign merely of our 
 ignorance of particulars that no doubt it will be granted 
 to future generations of men to discover. It is cer- 
 tainly no proof that the hypothesis of spontaneous
 
 10 THE LITTLE THINGS OF NATURE. 
 
 development is a reasonable one. "We are under no 
 circumstances justified in trying to accommodate facts 
 that we do not understand to speculations that are not 
 founded upon other and well-established facts. If they 
 will not fit, our wisdom is to wait. No one can discern 
 the seeds in the earth ; yet they are there. So are the 
 germs in the bran, waiting, like the former, for their 
 needful stimuli. Nothing is ever got by arguing from 
 
 .V our ignorance ; nor is anything ever got by too much 
 eagerness and haste to possess it. "Tarry ye the 
 
 "' t ' Lord's leisure," is a principle wise to observe alike in 
 method of life and in philosophy. If materialists, who 
 look with approval on such hypotheses as that of 
 " spontaneous development," would first seek to learn 
 all that it has pleased God to disclose concerning devel- 
 opment according to the laws of order, as exhibited in 
 the regular succession of plants and animals, and in 
 the history of the human heart and mind, they would 
 find that no philosophy is so wise and good, and will 
 help them through so many difficulties, as that which 
 starts from the spiritual and from MAN ; and primarily 
 from the Divine Humanity, which with all reverence 
 be it spoken is the point from which run the avenues 
 to all science and all nature, and in which they all con- 
 verge, like the branches of a tree in its pillar-stem. 
 
 Special examples of the growth of long-buried seeds 
 upon newly turned-up soil are easy to cite. Some of 
 the most extraordinary are those where poppies are the 
 subject. No plant in nature is more remarkable than 
 the poppy. Humble in its growth, its juice is one of 
 the most powerful sedatives known to medicine, while
 
 THE VITALITY OF SEEDS. 1 1 
 
 the essence of that juice, called morphia, is one of the 
 most powerful of vegetable poisons. At night the 
 flowers close in a peculiarly elegant manner, sleeping 
 as if lulled by their own lethean balm; the petals, 
 instead of being laid smooth and flat in the bud, as 
 happens with almost every other flower, are squeezed 
 and crumpled together, so that they never become 
 perfectly straight ; and when they expand, they do 
 so with such force as to thrust off the green chalice 
 that encircled them as a cradle. Every capsule, or 
 "poppy-head," contains hundreds of minute seeds, 
 which are beautifully chased upon the outside, so as to 
 form exquisite objects for the microscope, without 
 which the embossing cannot be seen ; and lastly, these 
 seeds, when they fall upon the ground, seem indestruc- 
 tible. They only spring up, however, and form new 
 poppy-plants when the earth which contained them is 
 lightly disturbed. Trodden in, so that the earth is 
 compacted, and elbow-room, as it were, denied to them, 
 they lie without any effort to grow. Of course, under 
 such circumstances, they cannot be stimulated by the 
 threefold essentials, sunshine, air, and moisture. There 
 is little doubt that within these last few years, and 
 probably this very last summer, crops of the wild 
 crimson poppy of our own country have sprung up 
 from seeds which were ripened at that remote period in 
 the history of the fragment of Europe we now call 
 Britain, when no portion of it was occupied by human 
 beings. The geological character of the surface and 7- 
 subjacent layers shows that thousands of years must 
 have rolled away since the parents of these poppies
 
 12 THE LITTLE THINGS OF NATURE. 
 
 flaunted their gay apparel in the sunshine ; and but 
 for the accidental disruption of the soil that contained 
 them, they would apparently have retained their grow- 
 ing power for ages to come. 
 
 When tracts of forest-land are cleared of the timber, 
 as often happens in North America, and occasionally 
 in our own country, the following season there springs 
 up in abundance where the trees stood previously, some 
 pretty herbaceous plant that was quite unknown there 
 while the trees existed, and which had been patiently 
 "biding its time." The explanation of such curious 
 appearances is perfectly simple. The herbaceous plant, 
 whatever it may be, had occupied the ground when 
 there were no trees there, forming some kind of herbage 
 or meadow, and letting fall its annual progeny of seeds. 
 In course of time trees have sprung up, their own 
 seeds conveyed thither either by human agency, or by 
 one or other of the wonderful contrivances of nature 
 which insure propagation, whether man give his aid or 
 not. These trees have offered too dense a shade for 
 the herbaceous plant, which retires, as it were, into pri- 
 vate life ; but when they in their turn are cut down, 
 the original plants return, covering the surface with 
 the old imperishable carpet. Is the mortality or the 
 immortality of nature the more wonderful? Every 
 season the ranks of the vegetable population of our 
 planet are smitten by death, there seems no hope for 
 their restoration. There is no sound, no movement, to 
 show that life is still throbbing; yet, with the first 
 kisses of the new-born year, the necropolis changes 
 into a scene of nimble and beautiful growth, and we
 
 THE VITALITY OF SEEDS. 13 
 
 see that it was not destruction that was effected by the 
 cold touch of winter, that nothing had really per- 
 ished ; but that it was life that had retired awhile to 
 gather itself up for a new effort, simulating death, 
 and which now bursts forth again in all the old exuber- 
 ance and sprightly sweetness. What looks like death 
 in nature is never anything more than the highest and 
 essential part of its life, pausing awhile that it may 
 start anew. The forms in which it is clothed are cast 
 away ; but the life never gives way for a single instant. 
 
 And this is the grand lesson to be learned froih the 
 consideration of seeds, and their wonderful vitality. 
 Every particular seed contains within itself the life of 
 the plant, just as one's own true life resides in the 
 spiritual body. Our leaves and blossoms drop away 
 with autumn ; the white snow descends upon our brows, 
 its flakes tremble in the wind ; the colors fade ; the 
 force declines ; presently the whole of the poor, old, 
 worn-out frame sinks helplessly in the dust, never to 
 rise again ; but who or what is dead ? Cross the dark 
 river, which in the material world is represented by 
 winter, and then all that is worth having is found safe, 
 and shining in the sweet lineaments of renewed youth ! 
 
 Many kinds of seeds are gifted with powers not 
 merely of retaining life under the ordinary circum- 
 stances of nature, but of resisting the most terrible 
 attacks. When wine has been made from raisins, and 
 the refuse has been scattered over the fields as manure, 
 it has been observed that the grape-seeds have vege- 
 tated, and produced young vines ; and this notwith- 
 standing the boiling and fermentation they have had to
 
 14 THE LITTLE THINGS OF NATURE. 
 
 endure. The seeds of elder-berries have been observed 
 A to grow after similar trials. Many experiments have 
 been made to ascertain exactly what amount of unnat- 
 ural heat seeds can bear without being destroyed. It 
 considerably exceeds that which plants can bear ; and 
 the same is the case with respect to extreme cold. / 
 
 Thus are the wonderful phenomena of nature not 
 only good and delightful to contemplate in themselves, 
 but intrusted with the higher value of representing the 
 great truths of religion. 'There is probably no true 
 doctrine in matters of religion which is not somewhere 
 illustrated in the processes of nature ; certainly there 
 is nothing in the benevolence of God with regard to 
 man for which we may not find some exquisite parallel 
 among the forms of humble nature, learning from them 
 even to understand it better, because shown in so sim- 
 ple a way. The "diligent hand" always "maketh 
 rich," both in worldly possessions and in the best of all 
 knowledge, which is that of the Love and "Wisdom of 
 God.
 
 .Sleep of 
 
 WALKING through the decorated fields of Summer, 
 before the scythe of the mower has laid their sweet 
 crowds low, or along the paths of some well-trimmed 
 garden, rich with the floral spoils of many distant lands, 
 and noting the cups and chalices of their thousand 
 blossoms, as they drink the tender warmth of the sun- 
 shine, we naturally imagine that the condition of a 
 flower, whether wild in the country, or forming part of 
 the elegant and cultivated company of the parterre, is 
 to remain, after once expanded, like the Electric Tele- 
 graph Office, " open always." Our ideas rest, as in all 
 other matters, upon what we happen to behold at the 
 moment, and this partial truth is believed to be the 
 whole ; and this temporary condition for it really is 
 no more to be the prolonged and the abiding one; 
 the abiding one, that is to say, until the flower shall 
 have worn out its little lease of life, and petal and 
 stamen, calyx and honey-bag, alike dissolve and are 
 lost in the bosom of mother earth, from which all 
 things come, and to which all return. 
 
 Flowers, ordinarily, are not "open always;" those 
 of many of the largest and most important classes of
 
 16 THE LITTLE THINGS OF NATURE. 
 
 plants close as regularly as day changes to night, 
 remaining shut during the hours of darkness, and 
 re-opening their lovely petals when sunshine returns. 
 The fascinating and innumerably- various phenomena of 
 their morning expansion and twilight folding, are the 
 illustrations, in part, of what botanists term the Sleep 
 of plants. Similar phenomena occur in connection 
 with the leaves, and together they form one of the 
 most beautiful displays in nature of the Divine Benevo- 
 lence as shown in little things. 
 
 If we examine a flower carefully, with a view to an 
 intelligent comprehension of how it is constructed, 
 not necessarily pulling it to pieces, but turning it over 
 and over, round and round, looking first at the out- 
 side, then into the depth of its heart, we find that it 
 consists, in the great majority of cases, of two distinct 
 portions an outer one, which is green, and in texture 
 not unlike a leaf, and an inner one, which is softer 
 than the finest satin, usually thinner than the thinnest 
 silver-paper, and exquisitely colored. The outer por- 
 tion is the "calyx," in which word we have only 
 another way of writing " chalice ;" the inner portion is 
 the "corolla," literally the "little crown," so called 
 from the poetical, and therefore good and true idea 
 which regards it as marking the day when the plant 
 is in the enjoyment of its highest honor and glory, 
 upon which it is "crowned," as it were, and thus in 
 the condition of king or queen when lifted to the high- 
 est pinnacle of royal dignity by having the golden 
 diadem placed upon the brow. 
 
 Let us look yet a little more attentive^, and we
 
 THE SLEEP OF PLANTS. 17 
 
 discern that this pretty flower-crown, this "corolla," is 
 in some flowers composed of many distinct pieces or 
 leaves, while in others it appears to consist of only one 
 piece, wrought into the form of a little vase. Whether 
 few or many, the component pieces of the corolla are 
 called the " petals," which name, when we would speak 
 correctly of them, we should always make use of, since 
 the word " leaves" applies properly only to the green 
 foliage of a plant. " Rose-leaves," often used for scent- 
 pots, are properly " rose-petals." Now the sleep of a 
 flower consists mainly in the changes of the positions 
 of these " petals." The calyx or chalice which encir- 
 cles them, and which covered them up while the flower 
 was only a bud, undergoes no change at night, or never 
 more than a very slight and scarcely appreciable one ; 
 the movement is confined almost entirely to the colored 
 portion within. 
 
 And now we come to one of the most captivating 
 chapters in the history. As there are scores of differ- 
 ent shapes of corollas, so are there scores of different 
 modes of closing, every different one determined by 
 the peculiar configuration of the corolla. This is no 
 more than we might expect from the analogies .of 
 nature, which is everywhere brimful of echoes, giving 
 us utterances over and over again of simple and elegant 
 ideas, that are not different intrinsically, but only pre- 
 sented to our eyes after another manner, just as the 
 promises of Holy "Writ are still identically the same, 
 whether they be printed in Hebrew letters, or in Eng- 
 lish ones, or in German. Who has not noticed how 
 various are the attitudes assumed by the different kinds 
 2
 
 18 THE LITTLE THINGS OF NATURE. 
 
 of animals when they compose themselves for sleep ! 
 It is the very same thing in our own private and per- 
 sonal right side and left side, doublings up, stretchings 
 out, and miscellaneous angularities ; every one of us 
 works out some principle of ease and comfort ; 
 every animal and every bird in like manner works out 
 some principle of happy repose, determined, to a cer- 
 tain extent, by the peculiarities and the arrangement 
 of the limbs, and signified in what we may often per- 
 haps deem only an accidental mode, but which is orig- 
 inal and inevitable to the creature manifesting it. 
 Again in like manner, every flower that is so con- 
 structed as to allow of the petals changing position, 
 has its own native, and peculiar, and invariable way of 
 exhibiting this beautiful fact of vegetable repose. The 
 poppy, that we spoke of just now, has four petals, 
 which at high noon stand apart, and form a crimson 
 bowl. When the sun sinks low in the sky, and the 
 birds are trilling their nestward songs, the two inner 
 petals have raised themselves so as to be upright, and 
 have coiled themselves one round the other ; the two 
 outer petals meanwhile also lift themselves erect, but 
 keep perfectly flat, and form a pair of great shields, 
 one upon either side of the coil within. \In the daisy, 
 on the other hand, also in the marigold, 
 
 " that goes to bed with the sun, 
 
 And with him rises weeping," 
 
 the petals are very numerous, and spread in a star-like 
 manner round the disc of the flower. Towards twilight 
 they all rise simultaneously, though slowly, bring
 
 
 
 
 \ 
 
 THE SLEEP OF JPLANTS.\ 19 
 
 >5^ 
 
 their delicate points together, and form a conical tent, 
 which neither rain nor prowling night-insect can break 
 through. 
 
 It is for the purpose of defending the delicate inter- 
 nal parts of the flower from nocturnal cold, and chill 
 morning and evening dews, and from the ravages that 
 might be made upon them by such of the insect tribes 
 as come out after dark, that this admirable provision 
 of the closing of the corolla appears to have been insti- 
 tuted, since there is nothing of the nature of sleep, in 
 the human or zoological sense of the word, to be detected 
 in plants. They do not require it. Men and women, 
 quadrupeds and birds, seek their pillows and their vari- 
 ous retreats when night comes on, or, at least, when 
 they have finished their day's labor or pastime, as the 
 case may be, because during the previous hours there 
 has been a great expenditure of nervous energy, which 
 requires for its re-establishment a long period of per- 
 fect physical quiescence. During sleep, the diligent 
 little masons, carpenters, and joiners of the human 
 body set vigorously to work, wherever repair is needed. 
 Like an active garrison in a besieged town, they reno- 
 vate during the night whatever has been damaged during 
 the day ; and when morning returns, we wake fresh, 
 strong, and buoyant, ready to start again. Would that 
 we were always proportionately thankful to Him who 
 "giveth his beloved sleep," and who thus daily replaces 
 us so comfortably on the threshold of existence ! In 
 plants there is no such expenditure of nervous energy. 
 They have no nerves. The activity of their life is not 
 accompanied by wear and tear. It consists solely in
 
 20 THE LITTLE THINGS OF NATURE. 
 
 growth, preparation of new material, and consolidation 
 of that material into new branches, twigs, and leaves. 
 Whatever appearance resembling sleep they may pre- 
 sent after nightfall, is not of the nature of slumbering 
 repose. It is simply a relaxed condition of the petals, 
 dependent, in most cases, upon the removal of the 
 stimulus of the solar light, whereby they are made to 
 subserve most elegantly the high and beautiful purpose 
 of protecting what is at once the most important, and 
 the tenderest, and most vulnerable portion of the flower. 
 The centre of the flower contains the apparatus which 
 originates the seed; and in the inmost core lies the 
 rudimentary seed itself concealed, like the infant in its 
 ante-natal state, almost invisible to the unassisted eye, 
 and exquisitely sensitive to the slightest injury. It is 
 to protect this that the so-called sleep of the flower is 
 called into play. When the petals fold together, it is 
 Nature, always solicitous to befriend, drawing the 
 silken curtains round the cradle in which her progeny 
 lies forming ; and as nothing so much assists the 
 growth and development of this tiny rudiment of future 
 tree or brilliant flower as warmth, directly the sun 
 shines again, the curtains are withdrawn, and the cen- 
 tre of the flower is turned as directly as possible 
 towards the life-giving orb. 
 
 Flowers are made so beautiful as we find them, no 
 doubt in a high degree for the delight of human eyes. 
 Before the appearance of man upon this earth of ours, 
 scarcely anything of the character of a flower had been 
 ultimated into existence here. Geology makes this 
 abundantly evident, together with the fact that flower-
 
 THE SLEEP Off PLANTS. 21 
 
 ing plants, properly so called, began to appear in plenty 
 upon the earth's surface only when the golden period 
 which we call the creation of man, was swiftly approach- 
 ing. Human delight, however, is not their only intent. 
 The happiness of mankind is enhanced, without ques- 
 tion, by every circumstance in nature, either directly 
 or indirectly ; but a special intent in the beauty of 
 1 flowers, as produced by their colored and satin-textured 
 petals, is that they shall act as so many concave mir- 
 rors, and reflecting surfaces, catching the sun's rays, 
 and concentrating and casting them upon the seed- 
 forming apparatus, just as white clouds beautifully fling 
 upon the earth light which they themselves have first 
 received from the common source, or as silken curtains 
 to parlor-windows transmit, when the sun is shining, a 
 lustre not their own to our tables and books, and even 
 to our faces. 
 
 And here it may be remarked that another use of the 
 painted petals of flowers is to attract little flying crea- 
 tures of good purpose, since, by the action of their tiny 
 feet, and by the play of their transparent wings, they 
 help, although unconsciously, to dislodge the pollen or 
 yellow dust contained in the threads of the flower, and 
 cause it to fall upon the seed-cradle, and thus help for- 
 ward the production of the seed, which, unless it were 
 fed by this yellow dust, would never come to maturity, 
 but wither away while no larger than the point of a 
 pin. How wonderful are the expedients made use of 
 in so simple a thing as a flower ! A flower has as 
 many friends as a human creature. The sun, the fresh 
 air, the dew, the nourishing earth, the rain, even the
 
 22 THE LITTLE THINGS OF NATURE. 
 
 cold of winter, alike lend their aid. Bees, butterflies, 
 
 I a score of almost invisible pairs of wings, visit it in 
 
 turn, every one of them doing its own peculiar good 
 service. 
 
 Many flowers close their petals at nearly definite 
 periods of the day, and others open their petals at par- 
 ticular times of the morning ; and there are many that 
 appear to act independently of the stimulus of light,* 
 since they do not expand for several hours after the 
 sun has risen. Perhaps they require the atmosphere to 
 be well aired. There are many more, indeed, that 
 open in the night time, suggesting comparison with 
 the birds that are nearly silent during the day, and 
 only open their sweet throats for carols in the darkness. 
 These have their counterparts also in moths and other 
 insects that only fly by night, so that there is nothing 
 in it anomalous or unnatural. Their habits cannot, 
 indeed, be unnatural, for they are quite as much a part 
 of the custom and method of nature as are those of the 
 flowers which expand with the song of the lark, or 
 those of the birds that chant over the "morning-glo- 
 ries," * or those of the butterflies that flirt their deep- 
 dyed wings on the bosom of the rose. So exact are 
 the times of opening and closing, that a "floral clock" 
 may be contrived by any one who will take the trouble 
 to collect together in a garden such flowers as are suit- 
 able, and plant them in lineal or circular order. Lin- 
 
 * " Morning-glories " are the flowers of the different kinds of convol- 
 vulus, all of which open at daybreak, and are remarkable for the splendor 
 and the purity of their colors.
 
 THE SLEEP OF PLANTS. 23 
 
 naeus contrived such a flower-clock in his garden at 
 Upsala, and others have been made in our own country. 
 Of course the difference of latitude, the change of the 
 aspect, and other circumstances, cause slight differences 
 in the time of opening, so that no list of times drawn 
 up in one country will exactly correspond with that of 
 another. But they always preserve the same relation ; 
 a particular flower is always an hour earlier or an 
 hour later than another flower ; so that when once the 
 periods at which either of them opens, under given and 
 definite circumstances, has been ascertained, the periods 
 of the others may readily be calculated. It is much 
 the same as with the positions of the stars, and their 
 relations to particular hours of the night, according 
 as the seasons change. Though Arcturus, and Orion, 
 and the Pleiades, "shedding sweet influence," are not 
 always to be found in the same part of the heavens, 
 yet when we espy either one of them, we always know 
 where to look for the others. The three great stars 
 that form the slantwise belt of Orion, always point in 
 a direct line upwards to the Pleiades ; and the same 
 three splendid diamonds always point in a direct line 
 downwards to Sirius, the most brilliant of the fixed 
 stars, and one of the nearest to the earth. Sirius and 
 the Pleiades are just about equidistant from Orion's 
 belt, so that there never need be any difficulty in deter- 
 mining them. 
 
 There is one large class of plants, constituting the 
 Pea-family, in which the sleep of flowers is often ac- 
 companied by a corresponding condition of the leaves. 
 Of course this latter is in no way subservient to the
 
 24 THE LITTLE THINGS OF NATURE. 
 
 protection of the reproductive apparatus, except in a 
 few instances, where we find the leaves that are nearest 
 to the blossom folding together in such a way as to 
 become a cloak for it. But this is very rare. \Ve may 
 observe it in the four-podded lotus ; it is said to be 
 very prettily shown also in the tamarind-tree ; and 
 those travellers in foreign countries who are quick to 
 notice such things, have probably detected other exam- 
 ples. The sleep of the leaves is a simultaneous but an 
 independent phenomenon, and its object is more like 
 that of animal sleep, namely, to give to the vitality of 
 the plant a respite from the employment to which it is 
 devoted during the day, and to allow of the quiet prog- 
 ress of its internal or domestic economy. During the 
 day, the leaves of plants are held in a constrained posi- 
 tion by the force of the sunlight, which draws them 
 towards itself as a magnet draws a piece of steel, and 
 all this time they are diligently engaged in the prepara- 
 tion of new vegetable substance out of the carbonic 
 acid, the water, and other available materials con- 
 tained in the atmosphere. All this time the leaves are 
 like so many industrious men and women, whom the 
 morning calls away from their pillows, and impels by 
 its inspirations to renew their daily duties. Their 
 allegiance to the sun is precisely similar ; and when, at 
 the close of the day, the great ruler retires, and the 
 constraint is removed, on the one hand we see the 
 work-room and the counting-house exchanged for the 
 arm-chair or the fireside ; on the other we see the foli- 
 age that just now was spread so vividty, droop with 
 rich and elegant languor, and lie like the ringlets on
 
 THE SLEEP OF PLANTS. 25 
 
 the neck of a child that has fallen asleep in the midst 
 of its play. 
 
 Nothing is more beautiful to contemplate than the 
 parallel between the life of leaves and that of man. 
 Infancy in the one is the early spring condition of the 
 other. Each has its summer of maturity, and each has 
 its autumn of decline ; while every separate day and 
 night is with each an alternation of activity and rest. 
 Leaves do nothing during the night that is to say, 
 nothing of the nature of work for the benefit of the 
 plant as a whole ; their activity ceases when darkness 
 comes ; they never fail, however, while alive, to resume 
 it in the morning. Nearly all that a plant contains is 
 prepared in the leaves. The roots absorb plenty of 
 crude nourishment, but it is in the leaves that this is 
 converted into genuine plant-food ; so that we may well 
 compare them to the busy laborers who maintain the 
 fabric and the comfort of society, men in the town, 
 women in the sanctuaries of home, every one of 
 whom who fulfils the duties of life is a leaf of the great 
 tree of the human family. "Well, too, may we expect 
 that in the evening they should show signs of weari- 
 ness, and repose themselves each in its own fashion. 
 Man comes home to the prattle of his little folk, their 
 tales of the day's wonders, told half out-of-breath, and 
 with sweet dance of innocent eyes to the music of min- 
 gled voices ; or he comes to the " wife of his youth," 
 happy in her little pride, that lives not so much upon 
 her knees as in the innermost centre of her heart, and 
 lifts up heaven into her face in small, sweet babe- 
 smiles that float like speech from lips yet speechless, 
 3
 
 26 THE LITTLE THINGS OF NATURE. 
 
 but to call her some day by the sweetest name a woman 
 can hear; home he comes to these, finding that the 
 Golden Age is not a dream of ancient poets, but a 
 golden thread that runs through all the years and cen- 
 turies, and of which he holds a filament ; and over 
 them he closes like the lotus and the tamarind. 
 
 True, it is not always so, as we may learn again 
 from other leaves that wing-wrung and dusty, seem 
 placed in nature only that they may supply contrasts. 
 But, when realized, how beautiful those evening hours ! 
 Feeling and affection fill them with all forms of human 
 delight. Is it surprising, then, is it anything but most 
 natural, that among the changes of the green leaves, 
 which are images of them in the world of plants, we 
 should find the most exquisite diversities ; the leaves 
 of the lupine fold into the shape of a lady's half-opened 
 parasol ; those of the wood-sorrel dispose themselves 
 into the form of a triangular pyramid ; those of the 
 white clover make a letter T ; those of the vetch kind, 
 which grow in opposite pairs, rise up face to face, like 
 two hands with the palms pressed together ? 
 
 We need not go into Botanic Gardens to see these 
 things, they lie at our feet, everywhere in the fields 
 and woods ; just as we need not go into the ranks of 
 the rich and great to see conjugal and domestic happi- 
 ness, since it is a gift equally to the poor and humble. 
 Thus we see that a walk in the country never need be 
 without enjoyment. Everywhere we have pretty specta- 
 cles of life in action, and like our own. And indeed it 
 often seems as if the most wonderful illustrations were 
 the minutest. Somehow or other, large things always
 
 THE SLEEP OF PLANTS. 27 
 
 seem to take care of themselves. Their bigness is a 
 safeguard. We admire them for their grandeur, but it 
 is hardly possible perhaps to love them so much as we 
 love what is little ; and something of the same princi- 
 ple seems illustrated in the ways of the Creator, the 
 little is always an object of consummate protection. 
 
 Lastly, as regards the sleep of flowers, it is to be 
 observed that those in which the corolla appears to con- 
 sist of only one petal, as in the foxglove, do not exhibit 
 this beautiful phenomenon. The structure of the blos- 
 som precludes the possibility of it. Here we generally 
 see the nocturnal protection of the stamens and pistils 
 provided for by the peculiar shape of the corolla, and 
 by its position. This kind of corolla is generally cave- 
 like, or the upper part of it is in the shape of a great 
 hood, which shoots off the rain as it falls. Very fre- 
 quently also this kind of corolla is pendulous, so that 
 in its drooping position it provides a natural self-defence 
 for the tender parts within. Whether we can discern 
 it or not, we may be sure that there is adequate and 
 beautiful protection of some kind. When we think 
 Nature has forgotten, or is partial, it is that our own 
 eyes are dim. Moreover, there are, in all likelihood, 
 many arrangements in nature which it is scarcely pos- 
 sible for eyes to make out, but which a reverent intelli- 
 gence may think of from analogy, and admire as greatly 
 as if they were visible. We do not "see" how the 
 myriads of tiny insects find their food ; but that they 
 are all endued at once with good appetites, the satis- 
 faction of which is a delight to them, and with abun- 
 dance of good nutriment, we may be sure.
 
 Insects* 
 
 THE most populous part of the empire of Nature is 
 that which is occupied by the various tribes of Insects. 
 The little creatures which bear this name are the most 
 diversified and splendidly-adorned of living things. 
 Their histories are so romantic as to exceed the wildest 
 flights of fancy ; their habits and customs embody 
 everything that we are accustomed to witness in the 
 larger animals ; their instincts are prophetic types of 
 the utmost ingenuities of human reason, as brought to 
 bear upon what ministers to our physical comfort and 
 welfare. Many kinds furnish substances of singular 
 excellence and beauty, such as honey, silk, and the 
 rich crimson dye called cochineal ; others are so de- 
 structive, when unchecked in their ravenous appetites 
 and in their territorial invasions, that the result of 
 years of peaceful growth is ruined by them almost 
 before we are aware of the attack. And yet we are 
 apt to pass by insects as worthless and insignificant ; 
 we look with pleasure, it is true, upon the lovely wings 
 of the butterfly, and upon the bees, resting on the 
 honeyed bloom, or as they work at their amiable task 
 with that admirable assiduity which makes them a les- 

 
 INSECTS. 29 
 
 son to us all, if we would " improve the shining hour ;" 
 and the sight is a fascinating one, even to the incurious, 
 when on a warm summer's day the brilliant dragon- 
 flies dart like winged javelins of blue steel among the 
 grasses, and meadow-sweet, and willow-herbs that hide 
 the margin of rural stream and river. But other insects, 
 so far from being objects of interest, are for the most 
 part disliked and hated, and it is thought very little 
 harm to suppress them summarily with the sole of the 
 foot. When insects are positively injurious to man, 
 and when they infest his dwellings, of course they must 
 be treated like other vermin. There is no more cruelty 
 in putting certain little flat-pattern creatures to death, 
 or in catching, if we be sharp enough, the nimble mem- 
 bers of another race, for the same purpose, so that we 
 may thereafter "be at rest," than there is in the trap- 
 ping of foxes, or the destruction of poisonous serpents. 
 Intelligent and kind-hearted interest in the wonderful 
 little beings which it has pleased the All-wise to sow in 
 such vast multitudes upon our planet, by no means 
 requires endurance of such kinds as are oifensive ; our 
 true course should be to consider the endless miracles 
 of beauty or of adaptedness to particular purposes, 
 which we find in Insects as a class, allowing our feel- 
 ings of dislike to weigh with us only where they are 
 really deserved. 
 
 Much, perhaps, of the popular dislike of insects arises 
 from their being seen under circumstances at once for- 
 eign to their nature, and painful to them. Garden and 
 rustic insects, borne unwillingly on the breeze, through 
 open windows, into our houses, or losing their way, 
 3*
 
 30 THE LITTLE THINGS OF NATURE. 
 
 and entering unwittingly and probably frightened, may 
 well appear uninteresting. They are out of place. 
 They are like those unfortunate quadrupeds which 
 Italian organ-boys carry about the streets. Could we 
 see those identical monkeys in their native woods, play- 
 ing forth their sprightly instincts amid the branches, 
 living, in a word, as nature intended them to live, 
 they would no longer be odious. We should perceive 
 that the tree was made for the animal, and the animal 
 for the tree ; we should then be highly entertained and 
 be filled with admiration. Just so, in order to form a 
 true idea of insects, we should not think merely from 
 the parasites and the vermin, the beetles, the meat- 
 flies, and the wasps ; nor yet from the long-legged 
 Tipula that struggles against the window-panes, con- 
 scious only of its imprisonment ; but from their kindred 
 and from themselves, as inhabitants of the fields and 
 woods and waters, their proper homes, where they are 
 always beautiful, and which they, in turn, make more 
 beautiful by their presence. Whoever has enjoyed the 
 sweet and serene delight of a day in the woods, while 
 Midsummer is saturating them with sunshine, would 
 sadly miss one of the most charming attributes of syl- 
 van life, were the hum of their invisible myriads to be 
 hushed when he went again. Even the still pools and 
 tiny lakes, which we admire for their limpid clearness, 
 and the sweet inverted pictures that lie painted in their 
 depths, gain perhaps a richer beauty from the eccentric 
 dances of the water-beetles, whose polished corselets 
 twinkle with light like that of dew-drops. 
 
 Let us, then, consider in detail a few of the facts of
 
 INSECTS. 31 
 
 Entomology. They are fully as attractive as those of 
 Botany ; and, being connected with the history of 
 active and conscious creatures, they open our percep- 
 tions still more powerfully in regard to the inexpressi- 
 ble goodness of God. 
 
 We found, when considering flowers, that protection 
 is a leading idea in relation to them. The same princi- 
 ple is manifested very wonderfully in insects, especially 
 in the care with which the parent disposes her eggs. 
 Few insects ever see their offspring. The blessedness 
 of human life consists in the feast of the eyes of father 
 and mother, when round, happy faces form a shining 
 circle in the firelight, and proud rich hope skips twenty 
 years for each, and fashions all that is good and noble 
 for their destiny. Birds, that build pretty nests for 
 their young, are probably happy in feeding the little 
 featherless occupants. Brute creatures that give suck, 
 have been envied before now. Even fishes, even rep- 
 tiles, live some time after the birth of their progeny. 
 But insects, excepting ants, wasps, and social bees, 
 end their little lives unknowing either progenitor or 
 child ; every successive generation is isolated from that 
 which precedes and follows ; they exist, feed, repose, 
 associate in love, leave eggs, and depart in peace. 
 Moths, butterflies, and others, seldom live more than a 
 few days after laying their eggs, and although some of 
 their kinds do certainly survive for several months, 
 they are only exceptions to the general rule that insects, 
 after depositing their eggs, very soon die. We find 
 accordingly, that the Divine Benevolence has endued 
 the female insect with the most amazingly acute knowl-
 
 32 THE LITTLE THINGS OF NATURE. 
 
 edge of the wants that will be felt by her unborn young, 
 when they have no mother to direct or provide for 
 them. The solitary bees and wasps (which constitute 
 different races altogether from those that live in com- 
 panies, and construct waxen or paper cities) labor 
 with inexpressible industry in excavating cave-like 
 nests in wood and stone, and in building cradles of 
 clay, leaves, cotton, and other materials, according to 
 their special requirements and opportunities. 
 
 Other insects, though they themselves take little or 
 no food, and that little in the shape of honey procured 
 from flowers, and which cannot be supposed to have 
 any personal care about eating, deposit their eggs upon 
 the leaves and stems of particular plants which will 
 supply abundance of agreeable diet to the infant grubs. 
 A third set, not satisfied with depositing their eggs in 
 a place of safety, cover them up tenderly against the 
 cold of winter. The female of the gypsy-moth has the 
 lower portion of her body thickly clothed with soft 
 down of the color of brown human hair, and with this, 
 while laj'ing her eggs, she forms a little bed for each, 
 detaching the hairs with consummate ingenuity, and 
 consuming about two days in the operation. Her part- 
 ner in married life has no such down upon his body, 
 evidently because he would find no such useful purpose 
 to apply it to. 
 
 The brown-tail and the golden-tail moths, whose cat- 
 erpillars spin warm nests for themselves before winter 
 sets in, understand the importance also of protecting 
 their eggs from the too-great heat of July and August, 
 at which time they are generally laid, excessive heat
 
 33 
 
 being quite as hurtful as excessive cold. They adopt 
 precisely the same plan as that in use among the Nea- 
 politan peasantry, who convey snow from Mount Vesu- 
 vius to Naples in the midst of summer, covering it 
 up in wool, wool being a slow conductor of heat, and 
 preserving the snow unmelted. The female of each of 
 these insects is possessed of a thick tuft of shining hair 
 upon her tail, in which part she is also provided with a 
 pair of living tweezers. The latter she employs to 
 pluck out the former, a pinch at a time, after which 
 she places the egg in the centre, cements it down and 
 smooths it over. Another curious kind of defence 
 from the rays of the sun not however on the part of 
 the parent, but practised by the child-insect is one 
 with which everybody who has ever noticed things in 
 the country, is familiar. We allude to the oozing out of 
 those little masses of white froth which hang so thickly 
 upon the herbage of the hedge-banks in early summer, 
 and in the interior of which we find the cool little 
 tenant. This froth is popularly referred to the cuckoo, 
 and commonly called " cuckoo-spit." The creature is 
 green, with large and conspicuous eyes, like those 
 which the phrenologists say are indicative of great ca- 
 pacity for language. When mature, it is brown, and if 
 its tail be touched it will jump the length of a yard. 
 In English it is called "frog-hopper," in Latin, Tetti- 
 gonia spumaria. 
 
 The immense capacity for enjoyment given to every 
 creature in some way or other, strikingly manifests 
 itself when we consider it in connection with the insect 
 tribes. Descending from the noble forms which enjoy-
 
 34 THE LITTLE THINGS OF NATURE. 
 
 ment possesses in man, through the successive grades 
 of animals below him, we still at every step find repre- 
 sentations of it. There is not a creature unacquainted 
 with gratification, in some shape or another. All derive 
 it from the circumstances amid which they exist, which 
 fact quietly suggests to us that the purest and most 
 lasting pleasures are to be found at our very feet, 
 that they are not necessarily the fruit of toil and out- 
 lay, but that they flow to us out of the very nature of 
 things, if we will but be content with what is simple 
 and genuine. Insects, above all the minor creatures, 
 seem to relish life. The inhabitants of the pretty shells 
 that strew the sandy expanse uncovered by the retiring 
 waves, adorning its brown wrinkles with sea-born jew- 
 elry, yellow, white, and pink, no doubt have their full 
 enjoyment of existence, but one would imagine it must 
 be marred by their exposure every time they are for- 
 saken by the tide ; the little fishes that play about in 
 the clear water-brooks are doubtless brimful of satis- 
 faction ; the lizards on the sand-hills, glittering with 
 green and gold ; the tritons in the weedy ponds, and 
 the small birds that hide amid the leaves, no doubt 
 have in every instance their abundant share of animal 
 happiness ; still they none of them seem to manifest so 
 much enjoyment as insects do. This may perhaps be 
 accounted for, at least in part, by the fact of insects 
 being principally always, indeed, when in their per- 
 fect form aerial creatures. In this respect they agree 
 with birds. All things, indeed, that get much fresh air, 
 and can sail when they like, and in whatever direction 
 they may fancy, through the sunshine and scented
 
 atmosphere that hangs over the green fields and sweet- 
 ens the dear pastoral or healthy hills of the country 
 must needs have a larger and wider sensation of phys- 
 ical pleasure than those which are confined to the sur- 
 face of the earth, or are unable to travel far from a 
 given spot. 
 
 Do we not find it so ourselves? The foot that is 
 familiar with the grass belongs usually to a man of 
 lighter heart than he whose soles seldom wander from 
 the pavement ; and the best elixir vitce is a run, as often 
 as we can contrive it, amid the sweets of new and lovely 
 scenery, where nature sits, fresh from the hands of the 
 Creator, almost chiding us for our delay. To take 
 special instances, however, of the enjoyment given to 
 insects, and thus of the benevolence of Him who or- 
 dains all these good things, let us cite the dancing 
 gnats. Every one has noticed, in calm summer even- 
 ings, what vast multitudes of these little creatures thus 
 disport themselves. They may be traced, while the 
 light wanes, till the eye can follow no further, and as 
 the motions evidently serve no purpose of sustenance 
 or reproduction, it cannot be doubted that the object is 
 purely one of pleasure. Whenever we see the wings of 
 insects vibrating, unless they are actually using them 
 to pass from one place to another, we may be assured 
 that it indicates the same kind of pleasant sensation 
 which induces the nestling sparrow, when fed by its 
 mother, to stretch its little pinions, and the lambkin, 
 while sucking, to wag its tail. The birds called from 
 the circumstance of the movement they make when 
 foedtng "wagtails," would seem to have a special
 
 36 THE LITTLE THINGS OF NATURE. 
 
 pleasure, as members of the feathered tribes, when ful- 
 filling this great instinct of their being. What can be 
 more beautiful than the gayety and frolic of butterflies 
 in the air? They frisk about, ascending, descending, 
 moving in every possible direction, performing zig-zag 
 pirouettes pf the most elegant and varied kind, just as 
 kittens do when upon the ground, in their more clumsy 
 but not less sportive gambols. 
 
 Here, again, there is no purpose of direct physical 
 utility subserved, the movements are all tokens and 
 expressions of pleasure. Have bees no pleasure in 
 rambling from flower to flower, and securing the sweet 
 spoil for the security of which they have built those 
 beautitul little many-chambered warehouses we call 
 honeycombs ? Pleasure always attends honest and pro- 
 ductive labor, and it would be contrary to all the anal- 
 ogy and harmony of nature to suppose that the bees 
 work with no more enjoyment than a watch possesses. 
 It is difficult to suppose that they have not indeed a 
 pleasure in the exercise of their little wits, over and 
 above that of collecting the floral nectar. We hardly 
 think what excellent botanists the bees arc. They do 
 not know what "species" are, it is true; and for the 
 matter of that, no more do our philosophers and savans. 
 But they do know how to distinguish "genera," and 
 may be watched going from one kind of flower to 
 another, as cleverly as if they had received lessons 
 from a professor.* The physical allurement of course 
 
 * The observation of my valued friend, Jlr. E. Holland.
 
 INSECTS. 37 
 
 consists in the greater or less quantity of honey that 
 particular kinds of flowers secrete ; some producing it 
 in large drops, others yielding only a taste. See, too, 
 how admirably the bees are provided with instruments 
 for procuring what they desire. Many flowers are so 
 constructed that the bee cannot enter bodily ; to meet 
 this difficulty the little creature is provided with a long 
 sucking-tube, which it can push far down into the blos- 
 som, so as to reach the contents. 
 
 It is beautiful to note how thoroughly the bee and 
 the flower are adapted one to the other. They are like 
 the old tree and the woodpecker, the fir-cone and the 
 cross-bill ; and it is wonderfully interesting, too, that 
 in reading the records of primaeval ages, held up to us 
 by Geology, we find that it was not until flowers, 
 essentially so named, honey-yielding, fragrant, and 
 painted flowers, began to unroll their sweet petals to 
 the sun of this world, that the little creatures we call 
 bees were introduced as members of its animal popula- 
 tion. Trees and plants, as well as animals, both small 
 and great, have existed upon the surface of our planet 
 from a past so remote that no man can speculate on 
 the date of its beginning ; but flowers have not so ex- 
 isted at least there is no trace of them among the 
 myriad fossils that are wrapped up in the rocks beneath 
 us, while of all other parts of plants, and of organs 
 equivalent to flowers, for the purposes of reproduction, 
 there are abundant traces. Butterflies also would seem 
 to be a comparatively recent dynasty. Neither they 
 nor bees existed upon this earth very long anterior to 
 the commencement of the human period ; showing 
 4
 
 38 THE LITTLE THINGS OF NATURE, 
 
 again that nothing appears in nature before it is wanted, 
 but that all comes in at the right time, and, when its 
 purpose is accomplished, departs. It is in this grand 
 fitting together of things, this method, this universal 
 adaptation and harmony of nature, that we have the 
 best and truest external evidences of its Divine origin. 
 The forms are superb, the colors are inexpressibly 
 exquisite, but it is the unity of the whole that impresses 
 us most deeply. 
 
 A few words respecting the life of insects may not be 
 altogether superfluous. And, first, as to their changes 
 of shape. The larger animals quadrupeds, fishes, 
 and birds step into existence in their perfect forms, 
 diminutive, it is true, but still complete ; all they want 
 is either a little more hair, or a robe of feathers, or 
 teeth to bite with after they have been weaned, as the 
 case may be. But insects, and several other of the 
 lower tribes of creatures, go through a very wonderful 
 sequence of changes. Every butterfly begins life as a 
 grub ; then it becomes a "chrysalis ;" only in its third 
 and last stage is it a winged creature. Not that the 
 grub is metamorphosed ; it contains within its soft little 
 body the whole of the future butterfly, and, when the 
 chrysalid condition is assumed, the butterfly often 
 shows as plainly in it as a flower while wrapped in its 
 calyx. In other words, the transition from the grub to 
 the butterfly is not a "transmogrification," but a sim- 
 ple casting away of outer vestments, and a growth of 
 the immature creature within to full and royal ripeness. 
 This it is which gives so much beauty to the corre- 
 spondence theologians are fond of pointing out between
 
 INSECTS. 39 
 
 the life of man and his entry upon the angelic state, 
 and the gradual development of the insect. All is in 
 man that he will ever have ; " there is a natural body, 
 and there is a spiritual body ; " the former is cast off 
 by degrees first the grub skin, then the chrysalid 
 skin ; lastly, the genuine immortal, who was always 
 there, stands free and unclogged, and can mount aloft, 
 just as the new-born-insect-angels, with their lovely 
 wings representative of man's new and magnificent 
 spiritual powers when he is disencumbered of his " nat- 
 ural body" soar up sunwards, our mortal eyes in 
 vain essaying to follow.
 
 EVERYTHING that occurs in nature is the result of 
 some law instituted to bring it to pass. No phenomena 
 are in opposition to the laws of nature; nor are the 
 laws of nature ever set aside in order to bring about 
 conditions or circumstances that would be more condu- 
 cive to man's welfare than the operation of the original 
 laws themselves. Even "miracles" are no doubt in 
 strict conformity with the primitive and immutable 
 scheme of Divine government which has maintained the 
 universe in its integrity and sublime order, ever since 
 the time of that sweet aurora when " the morning stars 
 sang together, and all the sons of God shouted for 
 joy;" and we call them "super-natural," simply be- 
 cause they are effected not by suspending the laws, but 
 by exhibiting the unaccustomed powers, of nature. For 
 there is a spiritual law within, and thus above, every 
 natural law, and which, being necessarily in perfect 
 harmony with it, may dignify and expand its operation, 
 but can never contradict it. If we feel disposed to 
 regard miracles as works requiring the suspension of 
 the laws of nature, it is again simply because we .do 
 not understand and in this our present life probably
 
 EXCEPTIONS. 41 
 
 cannot understand the immensity and fulness of the 
 laws of nature, nor see how occurrences apparently 
 quite at variance one with another, may yet be in har- 
 mony, and be quite compatible, when viewed by the 
 light of some grand and omnipotent principle which 
 originates and includes both. To take a familiar illus- 
 tration : every one knows that " fire burns," and that if 
 we touch what is red hot, it will most painfully blister 
 the skin, and that, if the contact be prolonged only for 
 a few seconds, the flesh will be destroyed with inex- 
 pressible torment. This is the ordinary law of nature, 
 and what at first sight we conceive to be the whole of 
 the law of nature, with respect to the action of fire and 
 of red-hot substances. But if a quantity of lead be 
 melted, and made so hot that it seems incapable of 
 any further increase of temperature, the hand may be 
 dipped into it without sustaining the slightest injury, 
 without being in the slightest degree burned ! This is 
 well known to chemists ; and men with nerve enough 
 to make the plunge, have many times proved it to their 
 startled friends and pupils. This is the eatfra-ordiuary 
 law of nature ; a law not in antagonism to the ordinary 
 law, but included in the general idea and constitution 
 of fire, part of which idea is that fire can be made so 
 hot as not to burn. The miracles, and the usual order 
 and method of nature, hold, in all probability, a similar 
 kind of relationship, the eotfra-ordinary laws which pro- 
 mote the former being so administered by the Divine 
 wisdom as to serve grand moral purposes, and this not 
 publicly and to excite admiration, but in quiet and 
 4*
 
 42 THE LITTLE THINGS OF NATURE. 
 
 solemnity. Such at least is the character of the mira- 
 cles recorded in Holy Writ. 
 
 When accordingly, we seem to find the common life 
 of the world full of inconsistencies and exceptions, it 
 is simply because we regard the several occurrences 
 from too low a platform of thought. If such wonderful 
 contradictions can be exhibited before our eyes as that 
 of the melted lead burning when it is only heated 
 enough to run like water, and not burning when the 
 furnace has done its worst, or best, how readily may 
 we believe that all other things which appear to be 
 inconsistent one with another, are in reality in fine 
 concord ; and that exceptions are only varied utter- 
 ances of some grand and simple ordinance that equally 
 governs the common and the strange. Every depart- 
 ment of nature presents such exceptions ; and it is 
 delightful to a reflective and pious mind to observe that 
 these exceptions, like the sacred miracles, are uniformly 
 charged with some errand of love, or with some new 
 gift from the munificence of the All-good. The com- 
 fort and enjoyment, either of mankind or of some 
 little creature, is always the proximate object ; and if 
 the end be not realized, the fault is with the intended 
 recipient. 
 
 To begin with the inanimate or inorganic department 
 of nature. It is well known that all substances which 
 have been heated, as they cool decrease in size, and 
 become of greater specific gravity ; or, in other words, 
 a little smaller, and a little heavier. Even things that 
 are ordinarily cold, become, under the influence of 
 severe frost, a little smaller. The strips of iron that
 
 EXCEPTIONS. 43 
 
 form the path for the wheels of the railway train be- 
 come shorter when the frost is intense ; the pendulum 
 of a clock, in a room where there is no fire, becomes 
 under similar circumstances shorter, and the " time" is 
 falsified ; an iron rod that, while it is red hot, exactly 
 fits an opening, is too small for it when it has cooled. 
 The exception to these usual phenomena is, that water, 
 one of the most valuable substances in nature, instead 
 of decreasing in volume as it, freezes, occupies more 
 room when it has become ice ; and instead of becoming 
 heavier as it freezes, is, when in the shape of ice, per- 
 ceptibly lighter. See how admirably this operates for 
 the advantage of man ! Had water been governed by 
 the rule that applies to other substances, in winter, 
 when the thermometer sunk to 32, or " freezing point," 
 the layer of ice formed on the surface would have im- 
 mediately sunk to the bottom; another layer would 
 have taken its place, and have similarly sunk to the 
 bottom ; and in a little while the whole reservoir would 
 have been changed into a solid mass, which no subse- 
 quent summers could have thawed, and the world 
 would soon have become uninhabitable, for want of 
 drink. As it is, the water is preserved in its fluid 
 form, and warm enough for use ; while the surface 
 oilers a play-ground for boy and man, agreeable in its 
 novelty and in the excitement of the exercise needful 
 to keep the body afloat. Sea-water does not freeze till 
 it is nearly four degrees colder than fresh water needs 
 to be before congealing, thus assisting to keep the 
 ocean open at all seasons. 
 Mark, in the next place, the curious nature of quick-
 
 44 THE LITTLE THINGS OF NATURE. 
 
 silver, or mercury. A very considerable degree of heat 
 is required to melt every other kind of metal ; but mer- 
 cury becomes fluid with no more heat than is supplied 
 by the " atmosphere of England ! In the Arctic re- 
 gions, and wherever else the temperature sinks to 39, 
 or seventy-one degrees below freezing-point, mercury 
 is solid, resembling a lump of silver, or any other white 
 and shining metal. There it needs fire to bring it into 
 the fluid condition ; but in our own happy island, 
 
 " Great, glorious, and free, 
 First flower of the earth, and first gem of the sea," 
 
 and in all countries of similar and even of harsher cli- 
 mate, so long as the intense rigor of the frigid zone is 
 never experienced, mercury is permanently molten. 
 Hence, we can use it for the construction of the ther- 
 mometer, measuring every delicate change in the warmth 
 of the air, and in the temperature of substances used 
 in the processes of arts and manufactures, which could 
 scarcely be attempted without the aid of this wonderful 
 instrument. 'Quicksilver is one of the most extraordi- 
 nary substances in nature. It supplies one of the dead- 
 liest of poisons, and one of the most potent of medicines. 
 It is the delight of children, as its globules roll prettily 
 up and down the tea-tray, chasing one another like 
 themselves in their swift-footed sports, and reflecting 
 every happy little face that peers into their tiny yet 
 brilliant mirrors ; man sees in it an emblem of the 
 heavenly flock that in this present life is broken into 
 particles innumerable, kept asunder by the dust, the 
 hindrances, the misunderstandings, the infirmities of
 
 EXCEPTIONS. 45 
 
 the life in the body, but which are yet all of one sub- 
 stance and purpose, spherical and bright, in their souls ; 
 and which, though the sport of the world, and called 
 by many names, Ephesian and Laodicean, Episcopa- 
 lian and Independent, shall yet resolve, when assem- 
 bled by Him who sitteth as the Refiner and Purifier, 
 into glorious and everlasting unity. 
 
 One other illustration from the inorganic world, and 
 we conclude. While quicksilver melts with the first 
 kiss of solar warmth, platinum defies the utmost heat 
 of the crucible. Hence, by the art of the welder, it 
 can be manufactured into little cups and other vessels 
 that are required to endure the intensest fire, serving 
 purposes of recondite chemistry which without it could 
 never be achieved. 
 
 In the vegetable kingdom this admirable arrangement 
 attracts us at all points. The idea of a plant, when 
 developed with all its parts complete, includes root, 
 stem, leaves, flowers, an.l seed. But every one of 
 these parts is at times found to be wanting, so far as 
 palpable and visible reality is concerned ; some plants 
 being exceptionally destitute of root, others of stem, 
 others of leaves, &c. The absence of the respective 
 parts gives an exquisite variety and gracefulness to the 
 face of nature, such as no poet can describe, and no 
 painter depict on his canvas. Were plants always 
 anchored to the ground by genuine roots, the mistletoe 
 would hang no golden bough amid the gray and tat- 
 tered thorns and apple-trees of mid-winter, a crowd of 
 living pearls entangled amid branches that wear the 
 semblance of death ; no lichens would enrich the old
 
 46 THE LITTLE THINGS OF NATURE. 
 
 tower and dismantled castle with time-stains of purple 
 and orange that make the deep sheen of the faithful 
 ivy yet more lustrous in its contrasted verdure ; nor 
 would orchids dwell, like birds, amid the boughs of 
 tropical trees, adorning the vigorous one with rich 
 hues, and scenting it with composite and warm aroma, 
 alike foreign to its personality, and rendering the de- 
 crepit far more beautiful in decay than it stood even in 
 the prime of its existence. The orchids are well known 
 to the lovers of choice flowers. After the forget-me- 
 not, the maiden-hair fern, and the pretty uncurling 
 leaves of our own old-fashioned English ferns, com- 
 forted with brown plumage till they are strong and tall, 
 there are none that form such links of pleasure between 
 the giver and the receiver. It is not, however, so well 
 known that in their native woods they are strictly aerial 
 plants, that is to say, that they perch themselves in 
 the clefts of the boughs, deriving their nourishment 
 from the air and from the decaying organic matter that 
 lodges around them, and that, if planted in earth, 
 many of them will not live. 
 
 Of stemless plants we have examples in innumerable 
 field flowers, and in many flowers of the garden, such 
 as the tulip and the crocus. They have flower-stalks, 
 certainly, but they have no proper stem. To this class 
 of plants is mainly owing the sweetly- variegated vesture 
 that conceals the soil, providing turf in the meadow 
 and lawn, embroidery for them when summer comes, 
 and tapestry of moss for the flanks of the waterfall. 
 Fancy the aspect of a country where the earth was 
 perennially like a street, or a newly-ploughed field, or 

 
 EXCEPTIONS. 47 
 
 a newly-gravelled garden-walk, and the figment will be 
 that of a world without stemless plants ; the flowers 
 and the fruit aloft, reserved for men ; no sea of daisies 
 for the tiny ones in spring ; no loved small hands over- 
 flowing with bluebell and wood anemone to a child 
 the blossoms of paradise itself. Among the stemless 
 plants are many acrid ones. The herbage of the fields 
 is by no means the exclusively sweet and juicy fodder 
 we may deem it. Buttercups are quite the reverse of 
 sweet. The pastoral animals eat but few of them, and 
 then apparently as condiments to the succulent and 
 insipid grass, just as we ourselves take pepper and salt 
 to our meat and potatoes. How beautiful, again, the 
 exception in regard to many of those low-growing 
 plants, when specially and directly serviceable to man, 
 that, unlike the enduring Trees, those great, grand 
 pillars which watch the rise and fall of generations, 
 they last only for a year. Wheat, barley, peas, beans, 
 turnips, carrots, if not annual, are only biennial. They 
 must be sown fresh and fresh every year ; so that man, 
 instead of living without employment ; thence lapsing 
 into indolence ; thence into evils, from which occupa- 
 tion preserves him, as he would most certainly do, did 
 his daily bread drop off trees into his mouth, like acorns 
 on to the pigs' refectories in the woods instead of 
 this, is kept continually engaged, tilling the soil, depos- 
 iting the seed, reaping, threshing, grinding, baking. 
 These occupations call others into play. The general 
 stimulus to all the powers of the mind shows itself in 
 inventions, art, and sciences ; and to the exceptional 
 circumstance of the staff-of-life growing upon an annual
 
 48 THE LITTLE THINGS OF NATURE. 
 
 instead of a perennial plant, man may ascribe, under 
 Providence, a large measure of his civilization, the best 
 temporal sign of which is the neatness and complete- 
 ness of his breakfast and dinner table arrangements. 
 As the moral culture of a community may always be 
 judged of by its treatment of women, so may the civil- 
 ization of a people or nation by the mode in which it 
 takes its food. 
 
 Further, it is noticeable among these little plants of 
 the fields, that, while most of the members of the vege- 
 table kingdom give out such odor as they may have 
 power to during life, the vernal-grass, the woodruff, and 
 others, are not fragrant till they have been torn away 
 from their roots, and have begun to get dry. The rose, 
 the lilac, the Daphne, and the acacia, pour forth their 
 perfume as a part of their day's duty. The woodruff, 
 that holds up handfuls of little white crosses in the 
 pleasant woods and shady glens, yields no scent till its 
 life has ebbed beautiful emblem of those who delight 
 us while they live, out of the serene abundance of their 
 kindly hearts, but whose richer value we only begin to 
 know when they are gone away, and of whose white 
 souls we then say inwardly, "He, being dead, yet 
 speaketh." So the haj-.field, that rolls like sea waves, 
 is scentless when we pass it uncut ; we hear the meas- 
 ured sweesh of the scythe, death lays each green head 
 low, and odor rises like mist. 
 
 The tall trees have their exceptional brethren no less 
 than the dwarf plants. Some, instead of denuding 
 themselves when autumn comes, keep their leaves all 
 through the winter. We call them "evergreens," and
 
 EXCEPTIONS. 49 
 
 at Christmas decorate our houses with their cheerful 
 branches. Save for their green solace, the world would 
 look very bleak and bare ; as it is, the exception passes 
 us comfortably through the sense of winter, and we 
 feel over again that no deluge is ever so dreadful but 
 that some little ark still floats upon the water, and 
 keeps life and hope intact. Look at that venerable 
 lime-tree ! All other trees spread their branches far 
 and wide, and, as long as they live, if we go under 
 them, and cast our eyes upwards, we can see more or 
 less of the sky, or at least there is plenty of room for 
 us to climb ; but the interior of an aged lime-tree is 
 filled with little twigs, that form quite a brushwood. 
 This impervious labyrinth offers a secure asylum for 
 the smaller birds, when pursued by hawks ; once in- 
 side, they can never be got at, and can rest, and go 
 forth at will to renew their minstrelsy. Thorny trees 
 and bushes, which also are exceptional to the general 
 structure of plants, offer similar asylums to little 
 birds. 
 
 The rule is that leaves shall be green. Wherever we 
 cast our eyes, the prevalent hue is that of tiie grass, 
 unless when burned-up by the scorching heat of sum- 
 mer, or concealed by the white snow-mantle of Christ- 
 mas, and even then we are reminded of it by the 
 laurel, the holly, and other trees which are not forsaken 
 by their foliage in October. But the leaves of some 
 plants and trees are not green. "When, for instance, 
 the garden amaranths creep out of the ground, they 
 are of a fine, lively red ; and this color they retain in 
 every part of their fabric till they die. In good green- 
 5
 
 50 THE LITTLE THINGS OF NATURE. 
 
 houses and conservatories there are many such plants, 
 i. e., plants dyed of some strange rich hue which quite 
 upsets the definition of a plant as "a green thing." 
 Nature will not allow herself to be defined. When we 
 think we have constructed our definitions so carefully 
 that they are accuracy itself, and have marked out our 
 boundaries and dividing lines, and then, quitting our 
 chairs, go abroad into living nature, the work is found 
 to have been vain ; some odd plant or animal, as the 
 case may be, is sure to be detected walking through 
 the fences ; we invariably discover that we only " know 
 in part ; " and when the larger knowledge has been ob- 
 tained, and we again compare our schemes with nature, 
 still it is the same, mystery within mystery, hill be- 
 hind hill, more and yet more islands in the infinite 
 archipelago of truth and wonder. 
 
 Among the most beautiful of these painted-leaf-plants 
 are the various kinds of Begonia, which upon the under 
 side are often of a deep claret color, while the upper 
 surface is marked with silvery spots and arches. Some 
 kinds of Caladium have their leaves exquisitely dyed 
 in the centre with crimson ; others have crimson spots 
 and blotches. The young leaves of the Dracaena are 
 rose-color ; those of certain Crotons are variegated with 
 rose and yellow. All this is quite exceptional, and the 
 peculiarity is accompanied in most 'cases by another, 
 namely, the comparative insignificance of the flowers 
 of these painted-leaved plants. It would seem that the 
 grand principle of equal gifts to every living creature 
 was here intended to be palpably illustrated. Where 
 the foliage is plain and simple, green without inlay of
 
 EXCEPTIONS. 51 
 
 purple or other tint, the flowers are in most cases 
 showy and ornamental ; where, on the other hand, the 
 foliage is so deeply enriched that it looks more like 
 flowers, then the actual blossoms are ordinarily of little 
 pretension. Everywhere in nature is this kind distri- 
 bution maintained. The man who is clever in lan- 
 guages is often inapt for physical science ; when the 
 hand can execute beautiful drawings, or make dull 
 wires and woodwork give forth delicious music, there 
 is often inaptitude for metaphysics. Every one has 
 something bestowed which, if faithfully and honorably 
 cultivated and diffused, shall be the admiration of an- 
 other ; no one need envy, for he has that in himself 
 which is also enviable, if he will only be true to his 
 own powers and duties. These pretty plants with their 
 deep-hued leaves, need not sigh for the blossoms of the 
 camellia or the tulip ; they are in themselves, though 
 relatively flowerless, a banquet for all taste and capacity 
 of delight. 
 
 Lastly, a few words upon remarkable exceptions in 
 connection with animals. Most creatures reside per- 
 manently in their native countries ; but some kinds 
 change their quarters every spring or autumn, going to 
 warmer or cooler regions, according as their instinct of 
 self-protection prompts them. Hence, in early summer, 
 our ears are saluted with the sweet cry of " Cuckoo !" 
 Hence, in winter, we see birds of northern origin, 
 Scandinavian strangers, little claws that have clung to 
 Lapland birches, and wings that have flapped near ice- 
 bergs. What tales of travel, were they gifted with 
 words ! One of the most useful of birds gives us
 
 52 THE LITTLE THINGS OF NATURE. 
 
 "Wlien these are boiled, the contents coagulate, and 
 become pleasant food ; all other things, when boiled, 
 become soft. 
 
 When we contemplate the organic provision made 
 for the nourishment of her young by the female ani- 
 mal, we find it numerically proportioned to the num- 
 ber of her offspring at a birth, or to the occasional 
 number. Woman has two breast-fountains, the cow 
 has four; yet the progeny of the cow is rarely in- 
 creased by more than two at a time, and usually by 
 only one. The exceptional excess is, apparently, for 
 the use of man ; for whose service also the bees store 
 a larger quantity of nectar than they require for their 
 own consumption; and the law, "flowing with milk 
 and honey," is shown to be a far-thought-of gift of the 
 Divine Benevolence. Woman is exceptional to all 
 other animals in her matchless capacity of nurse to her 
 young. All other creatures that give suck, soon wean 
 their offspring, and leave them to shift for themselves. 
 Not so the most sacred servant of God. In those long 
 yet patient hours when we lie, poor, helpless, thankless 
 little things, wailing in the darkness ; loved the more 
 tenderly, pressed the more closely to our infant home, 
 white as a snow-drop, and warm as the heart's best life- 
 blood ah, what a river of affection bursts from its 
 heavenly spring, pouring on past all the years, believ- 
 ing all that is good and noble, and ever listening for 
 it forgiving all that is weak and erring, pleading till 
 the heart well nigh breaks that the disobedient may 
 be turned to the wisdom of the just ; for it is love that 
 would surrender life itself rather than enter heaven
 
 EXCEPTIONS. 53 
 
 desolated " because they are not." A mother's love 
 is distinguished from all others in this, that it over- 
 runs, from the beginning, time and the world, and 
 looks to the eternal home where both shall live for- 
 ever. 
 
 5*
 
 CjjemistrjK 
 
 HITHERTO we have given our attention almost exclu- 
 sively to the objects and phenomena of living nature ; 
 we will now look for a little while at the marvellous dis- 
 coveries of chemistry, that magnificent science which 
 unfolds the laws and composition of the inorganic and 
 inanimate portion of the world. Chemistry, in its won- 
 derful disclosures, and the experiments by which we 
 are made familiarly acquainted with its principles, ap- 
 proaches so nearly to "magic," that had some of the 
 more curious knowledge of to-day been possessed by 
 the philosophers of the middle ages, they would assur- 
 edly have been dealt with as sorcerers. In an enlight- 
 ened age, men, if they cannot follow the quick steps of 
 those who lead, still admire their powers and achieve- 
 ments ; in a dark age, the speed and insight are attrib- 
 uted to some supernatural and perhaps unholy aid, and 
 the true and beautiful become objects of hatred and 
 persecution ; just as in all ages, in regard to theology 
 and all the highest truths connected with man's eternal 
 welfare, that which a man sunk in sensualities of neces- 
 sity cannot see the fulness and radiance of, seems to 
 him, contrariwise, only black and unprofitable error.
 
 CHEMISTRY. 55 
 
 It is possible to freeze water in a red-hot crucible, let- 
 ting the lump of ice fall out upon the table while the 
 vessel in which it was formed still glows with the action 
 of the fire ; it is possible to produce upon a parlor- 
 table light that shall seem brilliant as a fragment of 
 sunbeam ; it is possible, yea, and very easy, to prepare 
 a powder that on being shaken out of the glass tube in 
 which it is preserved, takes fire, atom by atom, simply 
 by coming in contact with the air ! One of the simplest 
 and prettiest experiments for winter-evening amuse- 
 ment by the fireside is the setting lumps of a certain 
 metal in a blaze by merely touching them with a drop 
 of cold water ! Had these things, we repeat, been ex- 
 hibited when men who had science and thought enough 
 to discover the wonders of nature were impeached of 
 communication with the powers of darkness, what would 
 have been the result and their fate ! Many have suf- 
 fered imprisonment and stripes for the promulgation of 
 truths and discoveries not so wonderful. Let us be 
 thankful that the Divine wisdom withholds the knowl- 
 edge of such things till mankind is able to receive it 
 reverently, neither suspecting the origin nor buffeting 
 the instrument, and is able moreover to apply it to 
 high practical uses, at once inviting the imagination to 
 further inquiry, and supplying new proof of the Benev- 
 olence that everywhere guides and overrules. 
 
 This Benevolence shows itself in inorganic nature 
 under two principal forms, viz., the composition of sub- 
 stances, and their action and reaction upon one another. 
 The presence of every primary element can instanta- 
 neously be detected ; and if it be a poisonous substance
 
 56 THE LITTLE THINGS OF NATURE. 
 
 k_ 
 
 that we are dealing with, we know pretty well how to 
 neutralize the bancM operation it would exert. Al- 
 though when we look at nature in the mass, the materi- 
 als of which it is composed seem infinitely diversified, 
 and, practically, no doubt are so, yet on analyzing 
 them, we find that the absolutely different elements do 
 not exceed seventy. It is much the same with the 
 composition of the world as with that of language. 
 There are scores, yea, hundreds of thousands of differ- 
 ent words in constant utterance by mankind in their 
 various countries. English alone has tens of thousands 
 of words in it ; yet how few are the letters of the alpha- 
 bet that are required for their construction ! By varied 
 intermixture of the simple twenty-six letters which 
 form our first lesson at school, all that is needful for 
 daily talk is produced all that is needful to express 
 the highest and loveliest sentiments, the most recondite 
 propositions, the most brilliant insights of poetry. 
 First, these little letters are combined into syllables ; 
 the syllables are united in twos and threes ; they are 
 variously arranged, multiplied and repeated, and an 
 inexhaustible vocabulary is the result. It is precisely 
 the same with the composition of the objects of na- 
 ture. The seventy primitive elements correspond to 
 the twenty-six alphabetical sounds and characters. 
 Some, like q and z, occur comparatively seldom ; other 
 elements, like a and e, are incessantly in demand. 
 
 The first result of the mixture of these elements is 
 found in water, lime, salt, soda, &c. When these are 
 blended, entirely new compounds result ; and the blend- 
 ing of these again, gives the-* infinitely diversified ma-
 
 COEXISTS T. 57 
 
 terials the analysis of which introduces the chemist to 
 the mysteries of his fascinating science. The bodies 
 of all animals, trees, plants, and flowers are similarly 
 compounded of a few of the primitive elements, by suc- 
 cessive processes of combination, the new compounds 
 often presenting few or no traces of the qualities which 
 marked their atoms before being united. Man is well 
 called the " noblest work of God." Aristotle defined 
 him as the " imitative animal ; " other philosophers have 
 called him the "cultivating," the "bargain-making," 
 the "cooking" animal; the chemist describes him as 
 an elaborate compound of carbon, nitrogen, water, lime, 
 and phosphorus, with a little iron, &c., superadded ; 
 and reduced to the ultimate analysis, in truth, his ma- 
 terial body is nothing besides, since the blood, the 
 muscles, the bones, the nails, and the hair, are only so 
 many exquisite mixtures, prepared by the agency of 
 Life direct from Him in whom we move and have our 
 being, and moulded by the fingers of infinite wisdom 
 into shapes of absolute perfection, and of incomparable 
 adaptedness to the noble purposes for which they are 
 designed. Similarly, the lovely and fragrant rose is 
 composed of no more than carbon and water, some 
 ammonia, and perhaps a little iron ; and, when disin- 
 tegrated in the chemist's laboratory, can be presented 
 as a few grains and drops of colorless relic. 
 
 How wonderful the guiding and controlling power 
 that, out of dull and inanimate materials such as these, 
 can weave shapes so transcendently beautiful, filling 
 them with energy to perform their comely uses, and, 
 when those uses have been fulfilled, and they die, caus-
 
 58 THE LITTLE THINGS OF MATURE. 
 
 ing other things to rise from their ashes ! For it is not 
 only a fact that the objects of nature are made out of a 
 few elements they are positively made out of identi- 
 cally the same particles, taking turn with one another. 
 There is no reason to suppose that a single atom of 
 matter has been added to material nature since it pleased 
 the Creator to dispose it in its present form ; it is cer- 
 tain that not a single atom has passed out of existence ; 
 in other words, the bulk and weight of our planet and 
 its enveloping atmosphere are precisely the same to-day 
 that they were thousands of years ago, when things 
 "began," whatever the date of that beginning ; and yet 
 during those multitudinous years, countless millions of 
 plants and animals have run their little race of life, 
 have died, decomposed, and returned to the dust. 
 Where has the material come from ? It has been sim- 
 ply the old material. Every atom has done duty over 
 and over again ; to-day entering into the composition 
 of a tree or flower, next year into that of an animal ; 
 after that, perhaps wandering in the air for awhile ; 
 by-and-by re-appropriated into the fabric of a plant or 
 bird ; in fact, enduring like a piece of money, unaltered 
 in itself, but passing incessantly from place to place : 
 to-day resuming the metaphor of the coin a widow's 
 mite, to-morrow part of the heaped-up treasures of a 
 Croesus. Our very breath is of this nature. The atmos- 
 phere we inhale is not of original English birth, nor 
 does it abide permanently in England. Part of it has 
 been sifted through the branches of the cedars of Leba- 
 non ; part of it has been moistened with the spray of 
 the unpastured sea, a thousand leagues from where we
 
 CHEMISTRY. 59 
 
 stand ; when we have done with it, by degrees it will 
 move away, on the wings of the wind, to supply nutri- 
 ment to people of whom we know nothing but that they 
 live, and to many a blossom "bora to blush nnseen." 
 In its history it is an image, viewless, but faithful as if 
 wrought in perfect marble, of the whole economy of 
 material nature, vicissitudes, wanderings, and transfor- 
 mations, all included. No portion is ever lost ; and 
 though the whole never comes again intact, we have it 
 renewed without ceasing. 
 
 Let us now cite a few examples of the operation of 
 the Divine Benevolence with respect to the power given 
 to man to detect the various elements of nature. 
 Every substance is discoverable by some " test," which 
 usually neutralizes it, or rather, which by uniting with 
 it, forms a new compound. The whole fabric of chem- 
 istry rests upon this wonderful principle, as one of its 
 corner-stones. Thus, if the least fragment of copper 
 be dissolved in acid, and the fluid be then diluted with 
 water until no trace of color remains, so potent, never- 
 theless, is the affinity of ammonia for the copper, that 
 a single drop of the latter fluid will immediately reveal 
 the presence of the metal, by uniting with it, and form- 
 ing a new substance of the loveliest violet color. Simi- 
 larly, if a morsel of lead be dissolved in acid, and the 
 acid be then diluted with water, a single drop of a solu- 
 tion of iodide of potassium will turn the whole to a 
 brilliant crocus-yellow. The presence of iron, after 
 the same manner, is discovered by the least drop of 
 tincture of galls, which blackens it upon contact ; that 
 of silver by a little solution of common salt, which
 
 60 THE LITTLE THINGS OF NATURE. 
 
 causes flakes of imitative snow to make their appear- 
 ance ; that of mercury again with iodide of potassium, 
 which turns the fluid containing it to a beautiful red. 
 Every one of these tests is reciprocal; that is to say, 
 we discover the presence of galls by administering a 
 little solution of iron ; and of ammonia by introducing 
 a little copper. The test for zinc is remarkably curi- 
 ous. A drop of ammonia causes a white cloud in the 
 watered solation of the metal, but in a few moments, if 
 we shake it, the cloud dissolves, and the fluid becomes 
 clear and limpid as before ! The value of these simple 
 facts to the science of chemistry cannot possibly be 
 over-estimated. Every substance, in the hands of the 
 magician of the laboratory, is a new Spear of Ithuriel, 
 extorting confession on the instant of the character of 
 that which is touched with it ; and as no two results of 
 "testing" in different directions are absolutely alike, 
 the chemist is provided with an infallible clue to all the 
 realities of the composition of things. How grand 
 and inexhaustible does the Divine Wisdom appear, 
 when we discover the humblest and commonest sub- 
 stances in nature to be connected by ties of affinity 
 which a little child may bring to light ; which are yet 
 so mysterious as to captivate the philosopher, at the 
 same moment that they provide him with his initial 
 keys of knowledge. By means of these "tests," we 
 can detect all kinds of mineral poisons. No deadly 
 substance can lie so deeply concealed as to evade an- 
 swer when called. Hence the difficulty, now-a-days, 
 of administering poison without discovery. Though 
 months may have elapsed after the commission of a
 
 CHEMISTRY. 61 
 
 murder by mineral poison, the traces may be found ; 
 some "test" will declare what has been done, and what 
 kind of poison has been employed. Along with this 
 there is another great fact to be considered. The 
 " tests " which prove the presence of the poison often 
 possess the power, if used in time, of neutralizing its 
 effect. This is the case with oxalic acid, a deadly 
 poison not infrequently given by mistake of ignorant 
 people for Epsom salts. A small quantity of lime- 
 water being added, the acid and the earth combine, a 
 white powdery substance is formed in a moment, and 
 this, being insoluble, is perfectly harmless. So with 
 the burning and corrosive fluid called sulphuric acid, 
 one of the most important of known substances, alike 
 for the purposes of chemistry and for those of many of 
 the useful arts. If a drop be spilled upon the table or 
 upon the fingers, the instant that a similar drop of any 
 solution of the earth called baryta is added to it, the 
 burning property is neutralized, and we have a milk- 
 white product incapable of doing harm. 
 
 No man need complain of the existence in this world 
 of so many hurtful and deadly things, when he reflects 
 how ready and certain are the antidotes. Wherever 
 there is an evil, there is always for the intelligent mind 
 some compensating good. No winter is so cold but its 
 asperities are outbalanced by the sweets of summer. 
 While the nettle is preparing the sharp sap that makes 
 its sting so virulent, the dock is preparing another sap 
 that shall assuage the pain. In chemistry we see more 
 perhaps of this grand principle than in any other de- 
 partment of natural knowledge, since the effects are 
 6
 
 62 THE LITTLE THINGS OF NATURE. 
 
 here at once instantaneous, varied almost without end, 
 and impossible to be misconceived. It brings palpably 
 before us, over again, the fewness and the universality 
 of the principles of the Divine government ; all phe- 
 nomena resulting in manifestations of bountiful care 
 for the happiness and health of man, and all the phe- 
 nomena of the natural world, being no other than the 
 economic laws of the moral world played forth in pic- 
 tures and representations. See, again, how beautifulty 
 the union of chemical elements, when placed in juxtu- 
 position, becomes subservient to the highest purposes 
 of human sympathy, in connection with invisible writ- 
 ing ! When the remnant of English troops, left after 
 the disasters at Cabool, some fifteen years ago, were 
 shut up in a fort, surrounded and vigilantly watched by 
 their enemies, they managed nevertheless to send brief 
 letters to their nearest friends. These letters to ap- 
 pearance were only blank pieces of paper. But they 
 were covered with words traced with rice-water instead 
 of ink, every word becoming visible in bright blue when 
 the paper was washed over with iodine ! This wonder- 
 ful substance, iodine, has the property of turning starch 
 blue or violet color ; and as rice contains a consider- 
 able quantity of starch, an invisible ink prepared from 
 it assumes that hue when touched with iodine, though 
 previously quite colorless. Eventualities, such as the 
 imprisonment adverted to, are quite as much a part of 
 the system of nature as the most ordinary occurrences, 
 and all are anticipated in these simple and beautiful 
 laws. 
 
 The nourishment of our bodies consists in a series of
 
 CHEMISTRY. 63 
 
 chemical actions. Some portion of our food goes to 
 the formation of flesh and blood ; another portion con- 
 tributes to the substance and solidity of the bones ; a 
 third portion is fuel. In this latter contrivance we 
 have a most striking illustration of the simplicity and 
 perfection of the Divine ordinances. There is no life 
 without warmth, and warmth comes of the combination 
 of certain elements, a process incessant in the human 
 body, and consisting in no more than the chemical 
 union of " oxygen " and u carbon " the latter the chief 
 constituent of fat, and the former inhaled continuously 
 as part of the air. Every time we breathe we quicken 
 the burning of the "flame of life," which is thus main- 
 tained quite unconsciously. When we " hold our 
 breath," we thereby slacken the supply of oxygen ; and 
 when we cease to take food, we reduce the supply of 
 carbon, each being equally requisite with the other to 
 maintain the cheerful glow that we call our animal 
 heat. Thus is one of the most agreeable sensations of 
 life a simple result of chemical action, the materials 
 broken up into atoms so minute as to be invisible to 
 the most powerful microscope, but all obeying the 
 great behest that all things shall work together for 
 the comfort of the world and of mankind, and thus 
 for the glory of Him who hath created them "for His 
 pleasure."
 
 tgperston of plants upon tfje jFace of 
 tije 
 
 TRAVELLERS, on their return from the exploration of 
 distant countries, tell us of every conceivable diversity 
 of climate and of terrestrial surface. Those who have 
 penetrated the Arctic circle describe snows almost 
 perennial, and a region so inhospitable that everything 
 necessary to support human life must be carried thither ; 
 those who bring home the browned faces that show the 
 intensity of Indian sunshine tell of arid and sandy 
 plains from which every particle of moisture appears to 
 have been evaporated long ages ago. Some give us 
 accounts of huge mountains where, at midsummer, the 
 white mantle of mid- winter still lingers undissolved, 
 though at the base it is fervid summer, all lati- 
 tudes being represented in miniature during the course 
 of a few thousand feet of vertical ascent ; others, 
 again, tell us of countries where rain does not fall for 
 a dozen years at a time, and where the surface of the 
 ground is covered with crystallized salts. Wonderful 
 is this, whatever the associations under which it is 
 regarded ; more wonderful yet is the fact that every 
 
 64
 
 THE DISPERSION OP PLANTS. 65 
 
 spot of earth, hot or cold, high or low, is supplied with 
 vegetation at once appropriate and ornamental. No 
 place is incapable of supporting vegetable life of some 
 kind ; and although there are districts where grass and 
 trees are never seen, and perpetual desolation gives the 
 idea of their being worn-out and effete, as happens in 
 the great deserts in the interior of northern Africa 
 even there it is not so much an absolute incapacity to 
 sustain life, as the want of springs of water that causes 
 the absence of it. In those sweet spots which have 
 become a metaphor for all happy and blessed breaks in 
 the history of trouble and sorrow, the "oases" of the 
 desert, water is present, and vegetation is triumphant. 
 Such an "oasis" was Elim, where "there were twelve 
 wells of water, and threescore and ten palm-trees." 
 
 How marvellous, then, in our eyes, does that Divine 
 power and wisdom again become, which provides a 
 fitting vesture of plant and flower for every spot of 
 earth, yea, and a vegetable population for every stream 
 and pond of water, for every lake and every sea, 
 whether salt or tasteless. Hot springs have their vege- 
 table inhabitants no less than cold rivers and chill}' 
 cascades. The driest acres of Arabia have plants con- 
 genial to them, no less than the broad plains of happy 
 islands like our own, where in spring we may watch 
 " from field to field the vivid verdure run." It does but 
 carry out beautifully and intelligibly before our very 
 eyes that the Creator not only formed and created the 
 earth, but formed it "to be inhabited." The idea of 
 "habitation" may seem to signify families of mankind, 
 and no doubt it does so in the first and inmost mean- 
 C*
 
 66 THE LITTLE THINGS OF NATURE. 
 
 ing, but a large and philosophical and reverent reading 
 of the text, will connect with it the families also of 
 the humbler portion of living nature, or animals in all 
 their variety, and not animals only, but the families of 
 trees and plants. All these has HE created " for his 
 pleasure," and though we may not understand the mode 
 and the degree of their ministration, still may we be 
 assured that the flourishing existence of crowds of 
 happy animals happy, that is, in the enjoyment of 
 their peculiar life and of myriads of blooming and 
 lovely plants, is an integral part of that Divine pleas- 
 ure ; and thus that the races, in all their diversity, of 
 quadrupeds and birds, fishes, and all the little denizens 
 of earth and sea, together with those of all plants, are 
 essentially included in the general term of inhabitants 
 of our planet, and were given to it in order that they 
 might dwell upon it and decorate it. In the present 
 paper we shall endeavor to show that the connection of 
 plants with the surface of our earth is in no respect a 
 less admirable fact than that of their existence, and 
 that the laws and arrangements by which the connec- 
 tion is maintained, rank with the most striking in an}' 
 department of the science of nature. 
 
 The great physical stimuli of vegetable growth arc 
 light and heat a noteworthy fact when regarded in 
 relation to the correspondence that light and heat bear 
 to the exciting and sustaining physical forces of which 
 we every day feel the glory as Divine wisdom and 
 Divine love. Where there are most heat and light, 
 trees and flowers of all kinds are most plentiful and 
 most splendid always provided that there is an ade-
 
 THE DISPERSION OF PLANTS. 67 
 
 quatc supply of moisture; where heat and light are 
 deficient, there we see poverty and dwarfishness. In 
 the tropics the forests are more majestic than any one 
 accustomed only to the woods of northern Europe can 
 possibly conceive, many of the trees clothing them- 
 selves with leaves as large as dinner-tables ; while the 
 flowers that are poured forth from every branch and 
 twig are finer than lilies. By people coming from the 
 extreme north, on the other hand, our English lilacs 
 and laburnums are regarded as miracles of size and 
 loveliness ; for in the frigid zone, although there are 
 "flowering plants" with hard and woody stems, answer- 
 ing so far to the idea of slirubs, they never rise more 
 than a few inches above the ground. Dr. Clarke brought 
 from Scandinavia six full-grown birch-trees in his pock- 
 etbook ; and the greater part of the Arctic willow is to 
 be found, not in the air, but below the surface of the 
 soil ! It is much the same at the extreme south of the 
 great American continent. Near Cape Horn, trees 
 which in latitudes a little warmer allow of the traveller 
 walking underneath them, become so diminutive, and 
 stand so thick together, as he ascends the mountain 
 higher and higher, that at last he may walk upon their 
 tops ! 
 
 It is very important to observe here that it is the 
 combined agency of light and heat that produces the 
 wonderful results seen in the tropics, again inviting 
 our minds to the contemplation of the grand corre- 
 spondence above alluded to. Clear and brilliant light 
 often brings out exquisite colors, as happens among 
 the Alps and also in the north frigid zone, where the
 
 68 THE LITTLE THINGS OF NATURE. 
 
 humble little plants called lichens and mosses ^re in 
 man}- cases dyed of the most brilliant hues, purple and 
 gold predominating. Warmth, in like manner, will 
 stimulate vegetable growth in the most astonishing 
 manner, but it is growth not necessarily accompanied 
 by the secretion of valuable substances, such as give 
 quality and real importance to the plant. In English 
 hot-houses, for example, we have abundance of spice- 
 trees, those generous plants that yield cinnamon and 
 cassia, the nutmeg and the clove ; but although healthy 
 and blossoming freely, they never mature their aromatic 
 secretions. Though they have artificial heat equal to 
 that of their native islands, which burn beneath the sun 
 of the Indian Ocean, we cannot supply them with sim- 
 ilar and proportionate solar light. Our cloudy skies 
 shut us in from the full and direct radiance of the sun- 
 shine, and wanting this, heat alone will not avail. 
 
 Next to be considered, as greatly influencing the 
 distribution of plants over the surface of the earth, is 
 the varying height of its different portions above the 
 level of the sea. It is a very interesting fact, and one 
 familiar to those who travel much, even within the area 
 of the British Islands, that the plants of lofty moun- 
 tains are, to a considerable extent, quite different from 
 those which enamel the fields that lie at their feet ; the 
 cold, the damp, caused by their frequent immersion in 
 the clouds, and the rarer atmosphere, being congenial 
 to different kinds. Mounting the steep slopes of Snow- 
 don or Helvellyn, we soon come to vegetable forms 
 that are never seen in the lands below ; and in Scot- 
 land the number of such new forms is again greatly
 
 THE DISI'ERSION OF PLANTS. 69 
 
 augmented. In warm countries, on the other hand, it 
 is very curious to observe how close is the agreement 
 between a certain number of yards of vertical eleva- 
 tion, with the departure so many degrees north or south 
 from the equator. On the mountain-chain of which 
 Mount Ararat is the most important geographical point, 
 all the varieties of vegetation betwen Syria and the 
 North Pole may be observed by any one patient enough 
 to ascend from base to summit. At the foot of Mount 
 Ararat there arc the vine, the olive and the fig, the 
 palm also, and the orange. A little way up, these 
 fruits cqase to ripen, and their place is taken by the 
 trees and plants of central Europe ; a little further, 
 again, those of Russia and Norway make their appear- 
 ance ; by-and-by the vegetation of Scandinavia becomes 
 predominant, and the crown of the mountain is lost in 
 unmelting snow a North Pole reached by vertical 
 ascent instead of by a long journey through seventy 
 degrees of latitude. The analogy of a great snow- 
 capped mountain in any tropical country with either 
 the northern or southern hemisphere is most complete. 
 The base answers to the equatorial zone ; the middle 
 portion answers to the temperate ; and the summit an- 
 swers to the frigid. In a word, our planet is like two 
 vast tropical mountains sliced off at the base, and so 
 conjoined as to let their summits be the two poles, the 
 arctic and the antarctic respectively. 
 
 Soil, and the geological composition of the ground 
 below, have also great influence upon the vegetation of 
 a district ; for plants, like animals, have their appro- 
 priate food. True, to the great mass of plants, it is a
 
 70 THE LITTLE THINGS OF NATURE. 
 
 question of little moment. They grow freely in every 
 kind of soil, and hence the colored fantasy of the 
 fields, in which plants grow inextricably mingled. It 
 remains true, nevertheless, that many kinds require 
 certain mineral constituents in the soil, in order that 
 they may attain perfection ; while others prefer certain 
 geological formations, on account of the easier drainage 
 or the greater retentiveness of water. It is interesting 
 to see how the plants of widely-separated districts often 
 agree, when the soil is the same, or nearly so. Many 
 of the wild-flowers, for example, of St. Vincent's Rocks, 
 at Clifton, are seen but sparingly, or not at all,, after we 
 quit Gloucestershire on our way northwards, until we 
 come close upon the sea-margin of North Wales. Then 
 they are found again, and save for the new landscape, 
 we might almost fancy ourselves breathing the soft 
 sweet air of Durdham Down. The rocks and soil of 
 these two districts are in many respects closely similar, 
 and their products illustrate the harmony that so often 
 subsists between the earth and vegetation. It is no 
 small part of the Divine Benevolence thus to distribute 
 and marshal the substances and objects of nature ; for 
 to the exiled and expatriated there are sweet and fond 
 sights produced as a consequence of it, that oftentimes 
 make amends for the severance, and, by association, 
 import the distant into the present. What an induce- 
 ment, moreover, to the study of nature ! If the sound 
 of a national melody heard in a far-distant land awaken 
 all tender recollections of the dear fields so many 
 leagues away, no less so does the spectacle of the trees 
 and flowers that were the delight of our youth, when
 
 THE DISPERSION OF PLANTS. 71 
 
 we behold them in the remote spot of our adoption. 
 Anything whatever that animates the soul with a secret 
 pleasure, whether it come through the medium of sight 
 or of sound, of poetry, or science, or philosophy, of 
 thought or of reading, or of intercourse with our fellow- 
 men, or, though last not least, of the little wild-flowers, 
 is a fine expression and result of the Divine Benevo- 
 lence in little things, in which we should rejoice and 
 for which we should be grateful. Oue of the most 
 beautiful and ennobling of all joys and satisfactions is 
 the joy of being grateful to God ; and nothing makes 
 us more truly human than the accustoming ourselves 
 to find reasons for and inducements to such joy in the 
 little and miscalled "insignificant" and trifling things 
 of nature. All are made for our personal enjoyment, 
 and to help us onwards into manliness and humanity of 
 spirit, and they will effect that result if we will open 
 our hearts to their influence. 
 
 Very curious indeed are the special arrangements by 
 which the seeds of plants are conveyed from place to 
 place, thus providing for the permanency of the green 
 carpet. Many kinds are provided with delicate feathery 
 wings, which the wind soon seizes upon, carrying them 
 for miles over the country. Every one in the heavenly 
 era of early youth has blown the little ships from the 
 dandelion into the aerial sea, curious merely to learn the 
 time of day, and unconscious that by this little pastime 
 the great purposes of nature were being assisted. It is 
 true that in many of the plants which have these winged 
 seeds, we do not recognize any special usefulness to 
 man ; and the means provided for their wide dispersion
 
 72 THE LITTLE THINGS OF NATURE. 
 
 may look like good labor bestowed to little genuine 
 purpose of benevolence ; but we are not to judge of the 
 usefulness of a thing by what it yields directly and 
 immediately to man. The population of the earth 
 includes millions of creatures besides ourselves, and 
 anything that seems useless to us is no doubt invalu- 
 able to some other race. Here it may be remarked too, 
 in passing, that the existence of so-called " useless 
 things" is one of the grand proofs of another and 
 nobler state of being. They are outbirths of a nobler 
 world, and have a destiny and purpose of their own ; if 
 they are useless in our eyes, they may be of great use 
 in the eyes of otfier creatures of God if not in this 
 outer world, yet in the inner one where their spiritual 
 forms exist, and whence they operate. Birds and 
 insects carry seeds about almost as busily as the wind. 
 The rough and hairy coats of quadrupeds often come in 
 contact with and capture the burrs of certain plants, 
 which thus get conveyed unintentionally for thousands 
 of miles, or even half round the globe. Rivers and all 
 running waters perfonn a similar use ; multitudes of 
 plants are found growing upon their banks, the seeds 
 of which have been brought by the current from distant 
 localities, and being stranded when the water is low, 
 they find at once an anchorage and an abiding-place 
 for growth. There are even plants that can jerk and 
 dart out their seeds like shots from tiny guns, for the 
 purpose of their wider dispersion ! Touch-me-nots and 
 cardamines form quite a miniature artillery when ripe, 
 discharging their little batteries with a vigor that is 
 quite facetious. All these things, let us never -forget,
 
 THE DISPERSION OF PLAXTS. 
 
 73 
 
 are special arrangements for promoting the beauty of 
 the world, for clothing it with green and graceful life, 
 and for thus carrying out the designs of Infinite Wis- 
 dom and Infinite Love. 
 
 The water, like the land, is filled with vegetation, 
 that is, everywhere except in the open sea, and even 
 there may often be found abundance of the strange 
 marine plants called Algae. Half-way across the Atlan- 
 tic there is an enormous submerged forest of one kind 
 in particular, called "gulf-weed," from its connection 
 with the great "gulf-stream" that makes its way from 
 the Gulf of Mexico. This mass of weeds is so dense 
 as sometimes to impede the progress of ships; and 
 when encountered by Columbus, in that wonderful ex- 
 ploring voyage westwards which was rewarded by the 
 discovery of the sentinel-islands of America, it was 
 thought by the superstitious sailors to be a barrier 
 speedily placed there by an angry Providence, to pre- 
 vent their further passage, or at all events to warn 
 them from prosecuting the attempt to cross the sea. 
 Similarly, in the remotest portions of the antarctic 
 ocean, there are prodigious sea-weeds with stems of the 
 girth of a man's body, and branches that extend through 
 the water to an almost indefinite distance. Our Eng- 
 lish coasts show two classes of these curious and 
 interesting plants. First, there are the dark leathery 
 weeds which form tapestry for the sea-washed cliffs, 
 and float so beautifully in the foamy water when the 
 tide comes up to salute them. Secondly, there are the 
 lovely green and rose-colored weeds that are seldom 
 more than a few inches in length, and which we may 
 7
 
 74 THE LITTLE THINGS OF XATUKE. 
 
 see lying about on the sands like fragments of roses, or 
 in exquisite arabesque of pink fibres. Were we to 
 seek them in their native habitats, or while growing, 
 we should find them erect and displayed, forming a 
 parterre for the sea, in its way no less lovely than are the 
 flower-gardens of the land. Every portion of the shore 
 is inhabited by its peculiar species of these delicate 
 algae. At high- water mark we see the great black 
 thongs of the bladder-wrack, and the pea-green laver ; 
 at low-water mark and in the tide-pools, we have the 
 pink and roseate kinds, for these latter die, like so 
 many fishes, if removed from the incessant contact of 
 the water, and soon bleach into melancholy films. 
 Ponds, rivers, even ditches, have their special vegeta- 
 ble inhabitants. Where the water is clear and still, 
 there are water-lilies, anchored far from the land, and 
 often with beautiful spires and campaniles of other 
 plants rising among them, like a floral Venice. No 
 timorous hand reaches these. As "faint heart never 
 won fair lady," so may it be said of the water-lilies. 
 To secure these, it is of no use to stand on the brink 
 and sigh. Ingenuity and perseverance will, neverthe- 
 less, bring them to land, and then how lovely and pure 
 a form ! The white water-lily is closely allied, both in- 
 form and nature, to that mystic Lotus of the Nile, rep- 
 resentatives of which, carved in stone, are still pre- 
 served upon the monuments of Egypt, where the plant 
 was regarded as a sacred and natural hieroglyph, and 
 where, doubtless, its purity and lustre conveyed their 
 right and ample meaning. 
 
 The water-lilies never grow in foul water, and always
 
 THE DISPERSION OF PLANTS. 75 
 
 prefer that which is in steady though slow movement, 
 loving especially the little bays along the edges, where 
 they can spread their broad leaves upon the surface 
 undisturbed, and expand their argent cups, brimming 
 with golden stamens, to the light of the sun. Towards 
 evening they close their petals in a kind of sleep, and 
 during the period of their highest life, which is that of 
 the preparation of the seed that is to renew the plant, 
 they not only close, but sink below the surface of the 
 stream. In many kinds the odor is rich and delicate, 
 and some sorts yield eatable seeds. The Egyptian 
 Lotus bore a rose-colored flower; but that does not 
 interfere with the beautiful concordance of these plants 
 with the ideas of truth and chastity rather does it 
 confirm the correspondence. Clear and moving water, 
 broad and elegant leaves, pure white or rose-colored 
 flowers, odor, modesty of life, and withdrawal in times 
 of darkness how beautifully all these characteristics 
 of the water-lily and the lotus combine to show us what 
 they signify in the language of nature ! 
 
 What a contrast with the sea-weeds is found in tf ees ! 
 Here in the north all our trees are much branched, and, 
 when full grown, form grand umbrageous sun-shades, 
 to which we can retire for shelter when the summer 
 heats fall fiercely upon our cheeks ; their boughs in 
 many cases decline elegantly towards the ground, so 
 that we can reach their nuts and acorns ; and in win- 
 ter, when they have cast aside their foliage for awhile, 
 we see a wonderful diversity in their styles of archi- 
 tecture ; some are massive, and seem to belong to the 
 heroic ages, as the oak and the chesnut ; others, like
 
 76 THE LITTLE THINGS OF NATURE. 
 
 the birch and the acacia, are graceful and delicate, and 
 seem feminine companions of the manly ones. In the 
 tropics, on the other hand, there are not only brandling 
 trees such as those of the north, though enormously 
 greater in their development, but trees that are wholly 
 devoid of branches, rising like tall pillars of wood, per- 
 fectly erect, and to a prodigious height, with a crown 
 of immense leaves upon the very summit. These arc 
 the palm-trees, the princes of the equatorial zone, as 
 the pine and cedar trees are the princes of the tem- 
 perate zones. In England we only see them in conser- 
 vatories, as at Kew and Chatsworth. They want much 
 more light and natural atmospheric warmth than are 
 ever rendered to them in Britain, and thus form a 
 peculiar and magnificent characteristic of the tropics, 
 filling the traveller with admiration, and awakening all 
 his sense of tropical grandeur of vegetation. 
 
 " Yet who in Indian bower bath stood, 
 But thought on England's good green wood; 
 And breathed a sigh, how oft in vain, 
 To gaze upon her oaks again 1 " 
 
 In the extreme north of Europe, and in the northern 
 parts of America, there are forests consisting exclu- 
 sively of pines and firs, and of such vast area that 
 many days' travel is required to traverse them. Thej r 
 are evergreen ; the animals and birds inhabiting them 
 are very few ; human habitations are scarcely known, 
 except upon their borders, where they adjoin cultivated 
 or pasture land ; and hence they form at once the most 
 monotonous of woods and the sublimest of solitudes.
 
 THE DISPERSION OP PLANTS, 77 
 
 It is here, as during the darkness of night, in solitary 
 places down by the sea, when we have wandered away 
 from the sound of men and the view of lamps, that we 
 feel the littleness of ourselves and the brevity of this 
 temporal life. Everything around is grand, solemn, 
 and perennial ; we are driven inwards upon ourselves, 
 and live for the time in that little secret chamber which 
 we all have in the inmost of our hearts, .into which 
 only God and ourselves can enter, and where we meet 
 face to face. Even our English woods, in their green 
 depths and inexpressible seclusion, give much of this 
 feeling when we enter them alone ; and it is good to do 
 so, and to receive their healthy and happy influences. 
 Our English woods differ greatly from those silent 
 pine-woods in the abundance of their living creatures, 
 and equally so in the plenty of their flowers and ferns. 
 Hence there is much to attract the eyes and thoughts ; 
 but, over and above all, there is the inexpressible feel- 
 ing of the isolation, and the nearness of Him who 
 made them all. It is well to visit these great solitudes, 
 for no places more powerfully awaken us to the Divine 
 appeal, "Have I been so long time with you, and yet 
 hast thou not known me, Philip ? " 
 
 Thus do we find in all countries of the world, upon 
 land and in water, plants appropriate to their several 
 stations, and every place being rendered cheerful and 
 beautiful by their presence. What would have been 
 the case had plants all required an equal amount of 
 warmth and protection, or an equal amount of moist- 
 are? Many spots would have been barren, and the
 
 78 THE LITTLE THINGS OF NATURE. 
 
 enjoyments of man have been reduced in proportion. 
 But go where we will, we meet with new illustrations 
 of the Divine Benevolence the true idea of the omni- 
 presence of God is that in every place we find the man- 
 ifestations of His providence.
 
 Disclosures of tljr fHtcroscopc. 
 
 MENTION has more than once been made in the pre- 
 ceding papers of the exquisite and marvellous spec- 
 tacles presented through the medium of the microscope. 
 We propose now to describe some of these in detail, 
 since it is through the use of this miraculous instru- 
 ment that we ai-e enabled to view not merely the little 
 things of nature, but the otherwise unknown. "We de- 
 light in the consideration of how much our eyes behold 
 trees, animals, the sea, the sky, flowers, the unfath- 
 omable beauty of the human soul, as set forth in the 
 various expression of the countenance, when the spirit 
 lives in light and freedom ; we are apt to overlook the 
 fact that our unassisted eyes do not introduce us to more 
 than the half of the world in the midst of which we dwell ; 
 thus that we delight in what is really no more than 
 very partial knowledge. And if intelligent and loving 
 interest in the obvious things of nature possess the 
 power as we are assured that it does by those who 
 have tried of giving length to human existence, by 
 multiplying ideas, which constitute, after all, the only 
 realities in life, how grand an elixir vitce must be sup- 
 plied by the delicate and unconsidered atoms that exist
 
 80 THE LITTLE TH1XGS OP NATURE. 
 
 beyond the line to which our ordinary vision reaches. 
 Possibl}', were the e}*e of man so formed as for him to 
 behold, without the aid of its lenses, the minute organ- 
 isms that the microscope brings into view possibl}- it 
 might not then be able to pierce the infinite altitudes, 
 read the story of the stars and the planets, and the 
 immortal harmonies we call the heavens, and which are 
 the pictures and preludes of the higher and original 
 heavens to be entered some day. To me it seems a 
 striking feature in the Divine Benevolence that the eye 
 should be constructed as we find it able, of its own 
 independent power, to traverse millions of miles, and 
 to rest upon the light of spheres so distant as Arcturus 
 and Pleiades, " shedding sweet influence ; " and at the 
 same time, by virtue of the added power which the 
 ingenuity of science bestows, that it should be able to 
 penetrate as remotely in the other direction. For what 
 space is in regard to the spheres that astronomy deals 
 with, minuteness is in relation to those which pertain 
 to the realm of the microscope. Were our eyes fitted 
 to behold, ordinarily and familiarly, the infinite little, 
 and were the infinitely-distant to be the privilege only 
 of the philosopher with the telescope, it is probable that 
 the whole current of human thought would be different, 
 unquestionably it would not be so noble, certainly 
 men would be less impressed with the awfuluess and 
 the grandeur of the universe. Seeing them only casu- 
 ally, and many men never seeing them at all, the stars 
 would be a mere fable of science, instead of the princely 
 inheritance of every human being. Therefore ma}' we 
 thank God that he gives us, unsought, so much glory,
 
 DISCLOSURES OF THE MICROSCOPE. 81 
 
 and yet permits to the same organ that commands the 
 sweet lustre of the winter skies a corresponding power 
 to interpret the invisible in the world of nature. 
 
 The range of the human eye may be judged of from 
 a consideration which gives us at the same time a good 
 idea of the scope of animal structure. Supposing that 
 an individual of every known species were to take its 
 stand between the two species that were respectively 
 the next larger and the next smaller than itself, the 
 smallest known animal being at one extremity of the 
 line, and the largest standing at the other ; and then 
 supposing we were to ask which creature occupied the 
 middle place, having as many degrees of size below it 
 as above, and as many above it as below, that place 
 would be found to be occupied by the common house- 
 fly. What a stupendous optical instrument must that 
 be which, assisted with a few brass tubes and some 
 disks of glass, shall discern a creature as much smaller 
 than a fly as a fly is smaller than an elephant ! 
 
 Perhaps the most strikingly beautiful of the micro- 
 scopic things of nature are found among those minute 
 and countless forms of vegetable life which ordinarily 
 are termed mildews and blight. At nearly every period 
 of the year, but principally in late summer and autumn, 
 there is scarcely a plant of magnitude that does not 
 afford an example. They are not necessarily perni- 
 cious ; many species, without question, are injurious, 
 causing quaint distortions, consuming the substance of 
 the leaf or other portion of the plant they may be 
 seated upon, and eating into it as rust eats into iron. 
 Others, however, appear to be more of the nature of
 
 82 THE LITTLE THINGS 
 
 the mosses and lichens that so beautifully embroider 
 and emboss the bark of the aged tree ; that is to say, 
 they are simply epiphytes, dwelling upon the plant 
 without damaging it, and comparable to the birds that 
 build their pretty cradles among the branches. When 
 moderately magnified, these little vegetables present 
 forms of the most exquisite symmetry, and are so 
 amazingly varied that the nobler shapes of plants seem 
 but fulfilments on a larger scale of designs primarily 
 set forth in themselves. The realization of this fact by 
 the mind, when we turn away from the charming spec- 
 tacle that we may reflect awhile, is the highest reward 
 that comes of the scrutiny. From the lowest nature 
 upwards, every object and every phenomenon is a 
 proem. Complete in itself, accomplishing a destiny, 
 rounding off a period, giving the last touch of perfection 
 to some profound and beautiful economy, every object 
 in nature is at the same moment pre-significant of some- 
 thing to follow. Thus is it wise to dive into the world 
 occupied by these pigmies ; for while amid them we 
 dwell with the earliest utterances, and going thence 
 into the world of great things, the latter smile upon us 
 as familiar faces. One of the prettiest of the pigmies 
 is a species of the common blue mould called Aspergil- 
 lus. The name refers to the resemblance it bears to 
 the brush used in Roman Catholic religious sen-ices for 
 scattering holy water, every plant consisting of a slen- 
 der stalk, and at the summit a tuft of beaded filaments. 
 Another, quite as elegant, but totally different, is found 
 in profusion upon the leaves of the coltsfoot, which it 
 ornaments underneath with yellow patches. Ever}-
 
 DISCLOSURES OF THE MICROSCOPE. 83 
 
 patch, when magnified, becomes a crowd of fairy vases, 
 the rims notched and thrown backwards like the petals 
 of a flower ! Botanists have discriminated many hun- 
 dred species of this race of plants, and the number is 
 daily on the increase. Not that new ones come into 
 existence, but that careful observation quickens the 
 eyes to see what was overlooked before, though passed 
 by not only season after season, but day after day. As 
 fresh air and early enjoyment of it are the best of cos- 
 metics, so is natural history the best of eye-salves. 
 
 Transferring our attention to the Mosses, in addition 
 to the prefigurement of flowers, we have that of the 
 most stately and regal of trees. For the latter, the 
 microscope is not needed. Every wood contains those 
 incomparable miniatures of the oak and chesnut which 
 botanists call Hypnum dendroides. Where the climate 
 and soil are congenial, they give us imperium in im- 
 perio, one kingdom within another ; the umbrageous 
 patriarchs overhead supply nothing further in form and 
 profile than is already expressed in their delicate arbor- 
 esceuce. Very pleasing is it to the contemplative thus 
 to find as a carpet for the feet, the same delineations 
 that make life in the forest a delightful renewal of 
 youth. Take their little flowers : no gem of the garden 
 will excel them. In the Hypnum above referred to, 
 and in all of its genus, the youngest state of the flowers 
 presents nothing very remarkable, any more than do 
 the buds of time flowers always excepting the buds 
 of the rose, which stand alone in presenting qualities 
 as lovely as those of the fully-expanded blossom. 
 When, however, a rather advanced condition has been
 
 84 THE LITTLE THIXOS OF MATURE. 
 
 reached, we seem, at first sight, to have the prototype 
 of a daisy ; a circlet of rays spreads from the margin 
 of a round cup, which reminds us of the milk-white 
 aureola of that pretty field-flower. These, however, so 
 far from being petals, constitute an exquisite hygro- 
 metric lid of many pieces, protecting the entrance to 
 the seed-capsule, which latter part the cup really con- 
 sists of. Sometimes the rays are like gold ; sometimes 
 they are rose-color, with horizontal yellow bars ; in 
 some species they are forked, in others bent inwards ; 
 in none, however, except among the plants called Phas- 
 cwm, do they fail to appear under one form or another. 
 The study of these unconsidered little productions is 
 enough for any man's leisure, and in the pursuit of it 
 he becomes a child over again ; that is to say, he lives 
 over again in the intense and inexpressible surprises 
 and sensations of novelty that make up so large a por- 
 tion of the heavenly era of early life. While it is good 
 that in entering upon the study of philosophy we seek 
 to do so with the meekness and humility of a little 
 child, among the mosses, with a fair microscope in the 
 hands, we are children once more, without knowing it, 
 yea, whether we will or no. Whatever tends to foster 
 and keep alive the emotions and susceptibilities of 
 childhood, is precious beyond all measure ; for though 
 manhood gives exaltation to pleasures, and though 
 pleasures of the highest dignity only become possible 
 when youth has passed away, the keenest and most 
 vivid relish still belongs to the childlike heart that is 
 simple without being juvenile, and joyfully expectant 
 without the aid of illusion.
 
 
 DISCLOSURES OF THE MICROSCOPE. 85 
 
 Further, there is inconcivable richness and variety 
 for the student who works with the microscope, in the 
 aquatics which, when they dwell or are found in the 
 country of the mermaids, we call " sea-weeds," but 
 which, when inhabiting streams and fountains, are 
 "fresh-water algae." The green and downy mazes that 
 float a little below the surface of the water in a still 
 pond, consist of an infinite number of attenuated 
 threads ; these in turn are composed of an infinite num- 
 ber of hollow green beads, placed end to end, and firmly 
 cemented together ; and in the cavity of each bead 
 for every one of them is an independent cell lies a 
 drop of fluid with a floating island formed of substance 
 more exquisite j'et. The lovely pink sea-weeds that lie 
 stranded upon the brown wet sand, uncovered by the re- 
 tiring waves, differ from these only in the vastly larger 
 number of their cells, and in the latter forming broad 
 plates instead of being disposed in necklace-like strings. 
 Both forms are, if possible, exceeded in beauty by a 
 host of minute organisms, which consist of only a couple 
 of cells. Such are the various species of Micrasterias. 
 More wonderful yet is the Volvox, for in this is super- 
 added to exquisite beauty the power of movement. Yet 
 the volvox is a plant as truly as an oak-tree or a lily. 
 "We are accustomed to regard movement as one of the 
 grand credentials of animal nature. True, in the wav- 
 ing of the trees when the wind creeps among their 
 branches, and in the wave of light that runs over the 
 cornfield, when gently stirred by the breeze, making it 
 seem a vegetable sea true, there is movement here, 
 and in the sensitive-plant we seem to have absolute 
 8
 
 88 THE LITTLE THINGS OF NATURE. 
 
 upon ourselves, and upon those about us, and upon 
 Nature, with more marvel, and more love, whatever 
 does this, is essentially music. Thanks be to the 
 Framer, that He has so framed human senses that they 
 may receive it ! 
 
 Animal-life, in its infinite variety of presentation ; 
 the beautiful stories that crystals can tell ; and a 
 thousand other particulars that lie in the great heart of 
 Nature, but that come forth at the first call of the 
 microscope, belong also to the romance of this wonder- 
 ful instrument. Here, however, for the present, we 
 must pause. It is well that between the acts there 
 should be leisure for the voice of a minstrel. 
 
 " These are Thy glorious works, Parent of good, 
 Almighty, Thine this universal frame, 
 Thus wondrous fair; Thyself how wondrous then! 
 Unspeakable, who sit'st above these heavens, 
 To us invisible or dimly seen 
 In these Thy lowest works ; yet these declare 
 Thy goodness beyond thought, and power divine."
 
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