38 THE AMERICAN BOTANIST. 



ends and the root begins, how the embryo breaks out of the 

 ground, how the seed-coats are burst in different seeds, the 

 effect of depth upon germination, the amount of pressure ex- 

 erted by the root in pushing downward, etc. 



The subject of digestion in seedlings is one often 

 avoided in a course of this kind but it is easy to show that 

 starch will not diffuse through a membrane and then by adding 

 diastase to the starch to show that diffusion takes place. 

 Starch may also be digested by making an extract of starchy 

 seeds and adding dilute sulphuric acid. Test in the usual way 

 for sugar. 



PROSERPINA: STUDIES OF WAYSIDE FLOWERS. 



By Rev. John Davis. 



<<TT is mortifying enough to write — but I think this much 

 * ought to be written — concerning myself, as the author of 

 Modern Painters. In three months I shall be fifty years old; 

 and I don't at this hour (ten o'clock in the morning of the 

 two hundred and sixty-eighth day of my forty-ninth year) 

 know what 'moss' is." There is nothing I have more intended 

 to know, — some day or other. But the moss 'would always be 

 there;' and then it was so beautiful, and so difficult to examine, 

 that one could only do it in some quite separated time of happy 

 leisure, — which came not. I am never likely to have less leisure 

 than now, but I zvill know what moss is, if possible, forthwith. 

 Thus begins the prose-poet, Ruskin the charming book 

 which bears the caption of this article. The "Sage of Brant- 

 wood" made good his promise. Proserpine was the result. 

 And where could one turn for a more delightful account of the 

 formation, growth and purpose of this lowliest of nature's 



gifts than in the opening chapter of the volume? Though the 

 author soon passes from moss to flowers; the latter compris- 



