quired its present vitality? There is a Fly-orchis also, as well as a Spider-orchis, which may have undergone similar changes. "A fanciful naturalist, who had studied this subject, thought it not impossible that the first insects were the anthers and stigmas of flowers, which had by some means loosened themselves, like the male flowers of Vallisneria, and that other insects, in process of time, had been formed from these; some acquiring wings, others fins, and others claws, from their ceaseless efforts to procure food, or secure themselves from injury*." I see, by the expression of your countenance, that you hesitate to ask the name of the humble plant upon which your eyes are fixed, doubting whether it be a flower or a weed. For my part, I know not which are the most beautiful-the wild flowers, or those that are cultivated; but the little tuft on which you are gazing is the pretty weed called "Forget-me-not." A poet has seldom any thing to bestow but the productions of his Muse, although she be often as poor as himself, as the reader will readily admit when he peruses the following return for a present of this plant: Thanks, Mira, for the plant you sent : My garden whensoe'er I enter, "Twill serve at once for ornament Each bud will cry, in tones of warning, * Dr. Darwin's " Origin of Society," canto 2. A nobler theme its flowers of blue Inculcate on the thoughtful gazer, That the same hand which gave their hue A poor return your gift insures, When paid in this poetic greeting ;- MAN, VERSIFIED FROM AN APOLOGUE BY DR. SHERIDAN. AFFLICTION one day, as she hark'd to the roar Drew a beautiful form on the sands of the shore, Jupiter, struck with the noble plan › As he roam'd on the verge of the ocean, A creature so glorious in mind and in frame, He is mine, said Affliction; I gave him his birth, I alone am his cause of creation : The materials were furnished by me, answer'd Earth ;— The gods, all assembled in solemn Divan, Let Affliction possess her own child, till the woes After death give his body to Earth, whence it rose ; WALKS IN THE GARDEN.-No. III. "The life and felicity of an excellent gardener is preferable to all other diversions." "What could I wish that I possess not here? EVELYN. Health, leisure, means to improve it, friendship, peace, And constant occupation without care.” To me the branches of the trees always appear to stretch themselves out and droop their leaves with an obvious sense of enjoyment, while they are fed by the renovating moisture of a shower. I have been complacently watching my shrubs and plants during this repast; but the rain is now over, they have finished their meal, and as they have already begun with fresh spirits to dance in the breeze and glitter in the sunshine, let us sally forth to share their festivity. What a delicious fragrance gushes from the freshened grass and borders! It is the incense which the grateful earth throws up to heaven in return for its fertilising waters. Behold! here is one of the many objects which the shower has accomplished: by moistening the wings of the flying Dandelion, it has conveyed it to the earth at the very moment when it was best adapted for the reception of its seed. "The various modes by which seeds are dispersed, cannot fail to strike an observing mind with admiration. Who has not listened in a calm and sunny day to the crackling of furze bushes, caused by the explosion of their little elastic pods; or watched the down of innumerable seeds floating on the summer breeze, till they are overtaken by a shower, which, moistening their wings, stops their further flight, and at the same time accomplishes its final object, by immediately promoting the germination of each seed in the moist earth? How little are children aware, as they blow away the seeds of Dandelion, or stick burs in sport upon each other's clothes, that they are fulfilling one of the great ends of nature !"* The various mechanism and contrivances for the dissemination of plants and flowers are almost inexhaustible. Some seeds are provided with a plume like a shuttlecock, which, rendering them buoyant, enables them to fly over lakes and deserts; in which manner they have been known to travel fifty miles from their native spot. Others are dispersed by animals; some attaching themselves to their hair or feathers by a gluten, as Misletoe; others by hooks, Smith's Introduction to Botany, p. 302. as Burdock and Hounds-tongue; and others are swallowed whole, for the sake of the fruit, and voided uninjured, as the Hawthorn, Juniper, and some grasses. Other seeds again disperse themselves by means of an elastic seed-vessel, as Oats and Geranium; and the seeds of aquatic plants, and those which grow on the banks of rivers, are carried many miles by the currents into which they fall. The seeds of Tillandsia*, which grows on the branches of trees like Misletoe, are furnished with many long threads on their crowns, which, as they are driven forwards by the winds, wrap round the arms of trees, and thus hold them fast till they vegetate. When the seeds of the Cyclamen are ripe, the flower-stalk gradually twists itself spirally downwards till it touches the ground, and forcibly penetrating the earth, lodges its seeds, which are thought to receive nourishment from the parent root, as they are said not to be made to grow in any other situation. The subterraneous Trefoil has recourse to a similar expedient, which however may be only an attempt to conceal its seeds from the ravages of birds; while the Trifolium globosum adopts a still more singular contrivance: its lower florets only have corols, and are fertile; the upper ones wither into a kind of wool, and, forming a head, completely conceal the fertile calyxes. But the most curious arrangement for vegetable locomotion is to be found in the awn or beard of Barley, which, like the teeth of a saw, are all turned towards one end of it: * Darwin's Loves of the Plants, canto 1. |