Aspects of Nature. 495 



Rhododcnrons and azaleas are plants of temperate regions, 

 the grandest lilies are from temperate JajDan, and a large 

 proportion of our most showy flowering plants are natives of 

 the Himalayas, of the Cape, of the United States, of Chili, or 

 of China and Jai^an, all temperate regions. True, there are 

 a great number of grand and gorgeous flowers in the tropics, 

 but the proportion they bear to the mass of the vegetation 

 is exceedingly small ; so that what appears an anomaly is 

 nevertheless a fact, and the efiect of flowers on the general 

 aspect of nature is far less in the equatorial than in the tem- 

 perate regions of the earth. 



