MISCELLANY. 331 



detected it in a great many seeds, and M. Boussingault, in his late experiments^ 

 has found it to exist in large proportions. Vetches and Lentils furnish from 4 to 

 5 per cent., and the seeds of Trefoil 7 per cent. — Mining Journal, April 28, 

 1838. 



Progress of Vegetable Life. — First, upon the burning sand, or naked rock, 

 the simplest structure of vegetable life, the Lichen, almost invisible to the eye, 

 fixes itself, blown possibly by the breeze. Its generation is scarcely understood — 

 it boasts no flowers which require time for their development, or food for their 

 secretion. They struggle through their ephemeral existence either upon the 

 confines of eternal snow, or upon the scorching regions of the torrid zone ; they 

 fulfil the general law of Nature — they die, but in their death are the harbingers 

 of life ; they decompose ; the particles of which they are formed unite with the 

 oxygen of the air ; an acid is the result, which eats its way into the crevices of 

 the rock, or insinuates itself amid the sand, when its other particles form new 

 combinations, and, burying themselves, become a first layer of vegetable mould ; 

 cracks and crevices thus are formed, in which moisture is deposited ; these be- 

 come enlarged, either by the expansion produced by heat, or by frost ; the granite 

 mass is burst asunder, or slow disintegration occurs. In the thin stratum of 

 mould a tribe a little higher in the scale of vegetable life is developed, probably 

 some elegantly formed Moss, which bears a miniature resemblance to the trees 

 and shrubs ; these, too, run through their remains for the birth-place of some 

 more perfect plants, such as the Grasses, the Saxifrages, the Wormwood, and 

 plants with small leaves and low slender stems. The vegetable mould now 

 deepens, generation succeeds to generation, plants of more complex structure, of 

 a higher stature, such as shrubs and bushes, begin to rise upon the rock, or the 

 sand, now no longer an inhospitable mass ; at last the loftiest monarchs of 

 the forest are developed, and spread over an immense surface, for perchance a 

 single seed, wafted by the wind, borne by some bird, washed by some flood, or 

 swallowed by some animal, and thus prepared for germination, is the means by 

 which new generation bursts into birth, and changes the face of Nature. There 

 is an uninterrupted circle of events on which the preservation and the gradual 

 improvement of all the productions of Nature hangs, and there is an endless 

 source of inquiry for Man. — Dr. Sigmond. 



The Cedar Mountains of South Africa. — They are a fine primitive range, 

 the peaks of which rise from 1,600 to 5,000 feet above the sea, and have a very 

 picturesque outline. The vallies between the hills are rich in a dark-coloured 

 vegetable mould, which is exceedingly productive. Corn, tobacco, and some 

 wine, are here produced ; whilst there is a constant and abundant supply of 

 water, which is more or less chalybeate. I was particularly interested about the 

 Cedar-trees, "the glories of Lebanon," which formerly covered this beautifnl 



