MIDSUMMER PAPERS. 



HORTICULTUEE vs. RUTS. 



AN" ESSAY READ BY T. T. LYON BEFORE THE MISSISSIPPI VALLEY 



HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



If we may accept the demoustratious of the mathematician and the scien- 

 tist, and their theories as well, we will be almost unavoidably brought to the 

 conclusion that the great congeries of planets designated as the solar system, 

 as well as that intangible and illimitable aggregation known as the universe, 

 in which vast worlds wheel their ceaseless rounds under the control of definite 

 and unvaryiug laws, is but an immense congeries of ruts, devised by the great 

 author of all things ; including here and there the erratic track of a comet, 

 thrown in to quicken our apprehensions by the possibilities, real or imaginary, 

 of collisions on a scale too grand and calamitous for mere human conception, 

 but whose paths may nevertheless be only ruts, so complex and involved that 

 "we are unable to trace them. 



As in the universe, so upon our lesser planet the laws of chemical affinity, 

 as well as those which control animal and vegetable life, are, in an essential 

 degree, infleiible ; so that the constant changes going on around us mainly 

 proceed in regular and recurring cycles; in other words, in ruts, with only 

 here and there an erratic or modified case consequent, possibly, upon the oper- 

 ations of that disturbing element in the problem, man, who would seem to 

 have been introduced upon the planet, or to have subsequently become au 

 element of discord thereupon, or as a modifying factor in the otherwise fatal- 

 istic problem. The lower animals, as well as birds and insects, are inllcxiby 

 guided in the selection of their proper food, in the location and construction 

 of their nests, in the provisions to be made for their periodical changes as well 

 as for the changes of the seasons, by laws apparently inherent in their natures, 

 of whose mode of operation wo can have no real conception, except as exem- 

 plified by their acts, in compliance with their beliests. These are, therefore, 

 merely ruts, devised by the great author of all things, to direct them infallibly 

 in the fulfillment of their missions. 



Altliough it sometimes seems difficult to draw the line of demarcation 

 between the results of what we are pleased to designate as instinct and those 



