1856.] Spontayieous Plants. 159 



SPONTANEOUS PLANTS. 



It is, perhaps, well known to our readers, that tlie marshes on S. Boston 

 Bay, between Roxbury and Boston, have been *' filled up " witliin a few 

 years, with gravel brought in railway cars from Quincy. This gravel, 

 or a large portion of it, was taken from a hill where it had remained 

 undisturbed for many centuries. Yet this large tract of " made land" 

 is now covered with a dense vegetable growth, embracing a great variety 

 of plants, most of them of common varieties, the seeds of which are com- 

 pact, hard, and heavy, and covered with an enameled shell, all of which 

 would seem to preclude the idea that they could have been wafted from 

 a distance, through the atmosphere. How could these plants have 

 originated ? Were the seeds deposited in the gravel and soil, many ages 

 ago, and have now germinated on being exposed to the action of the 

 atmosphere and heat ? Or is there some other process of nature by 

 which vegetation, under certain circumstances, may be produced without 

 any apparent cause ? 



Indeed, there are few things more extraordinary, or have been a 

 , greater puzzle to naturalists, than the appearance and development of 

 certain plants, in certain circumstances. It is sometimes the case, that 

 when a deep pit or well is dug, the earth, thrown up from a great depth, 

 fifty or a hundred feet, and which has been for many ages buried far 

 beneath the surface of the earth, on exposure to the atmosphere, and 

 heat of the sun, will give forth myriads of plants, of a certain descrip- 

 tion, which perhaps have not been seen in that vicinity for many year§. 

 It is stated on good authority, that after the great fire in London, in 

 166 G, the entire surface of the destroyed city was covered with such a 

 profusion of cruciferous plants, the Shymhrium irlo of Linnaeus, that it 

 was calculated the whole of Europe did not contain so many plants of it ! 

 It is also a well ascertained fact, that if a spring of salt water makes its 

 appearance, in a spot at a great distance from the sea, the neighborhood 

 will soon be covered with plants peculiar to a maritime locality ; which 

 plants, previous to this occurrence, were strangers to the country ! 



These circumstances are singular, and furnish a vast field of specu- 

 lation for the natural philosopher. 



An old lady reading an account of the death of a distinguished lawyer, 

 who was stated to be the father of the Philadelphia bar, exclaimed, 

 " Poor man, he had a dreadful noisy set of children." 



