127 



observers took divergent views ; and it sliows how difficult it is to allocate minute 

 algoid forms without a careful use of the microscope. Nevertheless the colour 

 given to rucks and even to water at particular though uncertain times, cannot 

 escape the attention of wanderers in the exciting fields of Nature ; thus Crabbe 

 in one of his poems has truthfully written 



" See how Nature's work is done. 

 How slowly true she lays her colours on ; 

 When her least speck upon the hardest flint 

 Has mark and form, and is a living tint." 



Indeed, while even botanists have scarcely .sufficiently examined or admired the 

 coloured dust that has fallen from Nature's robe, and marked the ground that 

 her garments have swept as she passed along, artistic eyes have been delighted 

 with the living stains of crimson, orange, and purple that appear not only upon 

 old structures, but on the highest rocks in Alpine countries. Thus Ru.skin in his 

 poetical language, speaking only as a contemplative artist of these minute but 

 lovely productions, says : — 



"And as the earth's first mercy, so they are its last gift to us. When all 

 other service is vain from plant and tree, the soft mosses and grey lichen take 

 up their watch by the headstone. The woods, the blossoms, the gift-bearing 

 grasses, have done their parts for a time, but these do service for ever. Trees for 

 the builder's yard, flowers for the bride's chamber, corn for the granary, moss for 

 the grave. 



"Yet as in one sense the humblest, in another they are the most honoured 

 of the earth-children. Unfading as motionless, the worm frets them not, and the 

 autumn wastes not. Strong in lowliness, they neither blanch in heat nor pine in 

 frost. To them, slow-fingered, constant-hearted, is entrusted the weaving of the 

 dark eternal tapestrie.s of the hills ; to them, slow-pencilled, iris-dyed, tiie tender 

 framing of their endless imagery. Sharing the stillness of the unimpassioned rock, 

 they share also its endurance ; and while the winds of departing spring scatter the 

 white hawthorn blossom like drifted snow, and summer dries on the parched 

 meadow the drooping of its cowslip-gold,— far above among the mountains the 

 silver lichen-spots rest, star-like on the stone ; and the gathering orange stam 

 upon the edge of yonder western peak reflects the sunsets of a thousand years."— 

 Modern Painters, vol. v. part vi. ch. x., par. 24, 25. 



But whether in our researches among the Cryptogamic forms we gain addi- 

 tional condim* nts for the table, or add to the number of species and thus extend 

 our knowledge in the domains of Nature, we cannot but feel pleasure in the pur- 

 suit, and agree with M. Vaucher of Geneva, who was a devoted searcher among 

 the lower tribes of vegetation, that it was an empire whose bounds he desired to 

 extend, believing that no happier kind of life is to be found, or more real plea- 

 sures enjoyed than what Nature affords to those who truly love her. 



