THE VEGETABLE KINGDOM. 435 



gnomes, with tears, bear away its soul to paradise on their 

 diaphanous wings. 



Struck with the imposing aspect of the aged denizens 

 of the forests, the ancients revered them, thinking that 

 under their trunks tranquil divinities kept themselves hid- 

 den from mortal eyes. Their sombre recesses sent a thrill 

 of religious terror through the breasts of all. The lapse of 

 ages has not yet everywhere rooted out such ideas. In the 

 legends of Japan it is said that cedars which have stood for 

 centuries enjoy such an exuberance of life that drops of 

 blood may sometimes be seen oozing from them as they 

 are cut by the axe ; and ancient traditions even add that 

 they have souls exactly like those of men and of the gods. 

 Hence the unspeakable dread of the belated Japanese 

 woodcutter when he passes through these dark forests, in 

 which every gnarled trunk appears like a menacing and 

 terrible shade ! 



On the other hand, as the genius of Descartes was pow- 

 erful enough to make the bulk of men believe that animals 

 were only simple automatons, set going in order to accom- 

 plish a certain number of acts, so many naturalists, on still 

 more plausible grounds, and in particular Hales, whose 

 beautiful experiments laid the foundation of vegetable phys- 

 iology, leaned strongly to the view of considering plants as 

 so many structures entirely under the empire of material 

 forces. 



But neither of the two views above described finds an 

 asylum at the present day in the severe domain of science. 

 We cannot liken the phenomena of vegetable life either to 

 simple physico-chemical action, or to a supreme intellectual 



