looking like rubies in a rusty setting. More mature, the crimson petals begin to spread, 

 and reveal tlieir still more rosy centres ; and at last the ring of crimson stamens gradually 

 unfolds, and forms a glowing halo round the centre. This description is as accurate as 



beautiful. The clove is the unexpanded flower-bud of the Caryopbyllus aromaticus, and 



has been known in commerce for two thousand years. The plant is a native of the Moluc- 

 cas, and other islands in the Chinese seas. A fine tree has been known to yield one hun- 

 dred and twenty -five pounds of this spice in a season ; and as five thousand cloves only 

 weigh one pound, there must at least have been six hundred and twenty-five thousand 



flowers upon this single tree. The Elder has been supposed by some to be the tree on 



which Judas hanged himself. According to others, it was a fig-tree. It was formerly 



believed, in Scotland, that the dwarf birch is stunted in growth, because the rods were 



formed of it with which Christ was scourged. In Holland, there are many orange-trees 



which have been in the same family two hundred and three hundred years ; one, at Ver- 

 sailles, has the inscription, " Plauted in 1421 ;" one at Rome, in the Convent of St. Sabina, 



is said to have been planted by St. Dominic in 1200. A gum-tree in Tasmania is stated 



to be two hundred and fifty feet high, with a diameter of thirty feet. This is reputed to 



be the oldest tree in the world. Some persons have kept toads for pets. Dr. Townson 



kept one he called " Musidora," to guard his dessert from flies. Dogs in a state of nature, 



it is said, never bark ; their barking is an acquired habit — an efl"ort to speak, which he 

 derives from his association with man. Columbus found the dogs which he had previously 



taken to America, had lost their propensity to barking. Scale and red spider may be 



destroyed by the following solution : Four ounces of quick-lime, and the same quantity of 

 flowers of sulphur, boiled for a quarter of an hour in a gallon of water. This, when decanted, 

 forms a clear, amber-colored solution ; a single application to scale only is necessary, using 

 a brush, and would require probably but a small admixture of water, if any. In the case 

 of red spider, the solution, somewhat weakened, must be applied with a garden syringe, 

 care being taken to reach the under part of the leaves as much as possible. It would 

 discolor the paint of the house. 



The Advent of Man upon the Earth. — The following passage from Hugh Miller's Testi- 

 mony of the Rocks, is full of thought and truth : "Not until the intio.luction of man upon 

 earth, do we find a creature whose works sensibly affect and modify the aspects of nature. 

 But when man appears, how mighty the change which he effects ! Immediately on his 

 creation, he takes under his care the vegetable productions of use and show : it becomes 

 his business to keep and dress a garden. He next becomes a tiller of fields ; then a planter 

 of vineyards. Here he cuts down great forests ; there he rears extensive woods. He makes 

 himself pl^.ces of habitation ; and busy cities spring up as the trophies of his diligence and 

 skill. His labors, as they grow upon the waste, affect the appearance of vast continents, 

 until, at length, from many a hill-top and tall spire, scarce a rood of ground can be seen on 

 which he has not built, or sown, or planted, or around wliich he has not erected his walls 

 or reared his hedges. Man, i« this great department of industry, is what none of his pre- 

 decessors upon the earth ever were : ' a fellow-worker' with the Creator. He is a mighty 

 improver of creation. We recognize that as improvement which adapts nature more thor- 

 oughly to man's own necessities and wants, and renders it more pleasing both to his sense 

 of the aesthetic and to his more material senses also. He adds to the beauty of the flowers 

 which he takes under his charge — to the delicacy and fertility of the fruits ; the seeds of 

 the wild grasses become corn beneath his care ; the green herb3 grow great of root or bulb, 

 or bulky and succulent of top and loaf; the wild produce of nature sports under Ids liand ; 

 rose and lily broaden their disks and multiply their petals; the harsh green crab swells 

 nto a delicious golden-rinded apple, streaked with crimson ; the productions of his 



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