il© STUDIES OF NATURE. 



nefkial, by reducing them into harmony with 

 her's. In order to afcertain what plants are bed 

 adapted to fucceed in fuch and fuch a diftrid:, you 

 have only to pay attention to the wild plants which 

 thrive there fpontaneoufly, and which are diftin- 

 guifhable for their vigor and for their multitude : 

 then fubilitute in their place domeftic plants, 

 which have the fame kind of flowers and leaves. 

 Wherever umbelliferous plants grow, you may put 

 in their room fuch of our culinary vegetables as 

 have mod analogy with them, from their leaves, 

 their flowers, their roots, and their grains, fuch as 

 the daucus genus : the arthichoke will there ufe- 

 fully replace the gaudy thiftle ; the domeftic 

 plumb-tree ingrafted on a wild flock of the fame 

 plant, in the very place where this laft fpontane- 

 oufly fprung up, will become extremely vigorous. 

 I am perfuaded that by thefe natural approxima- 

 tions, advantage might be derived from the molt 

 barren fands and rocks ; for there is not a fingle 

 genus of wild plants but what contains a fpecies 

 fit for food. 



But it was not fufficient for Nature to have efta- 

 bliflied fo many harmonies between plants, and 

 the fituations in which they were deftined to vege- 

 tate, had fhe not likewife provided means for re- 

 ftoring them, when deflroyed by the intolerant 

 culture of Man. Let a piece of ground be left 



uncultivated, 



