CONTENTS 



CHAPTER XII 



ON PLANTS WHICH ADD TO CONTINENTS 



PAGE 



Lake Aral and Lake Tschad — Mangrove swamps of West Africa — 

 New mudbanks colonized — Fish, oysters, birds, and mosquitoes 

 — Grasping- roots and seedlings — Extent of mangroves — Tou ra- 

 dons of the Rhone— Sea-meadows of Britain — Floating pollen — 

 Reeds and sedges of estuarine meadows — Storms — Plants on 

 ships' hulls — Kelps and tangles in storms — Are seaweeds use- 

 less?— Fish . . . . ... 156 



CHAPTER XIII 



ROCKS, STONES, AND SCENERY 



An old wall — Beautiful colours — Insects — Nature's chief aim — Hard 

 times of lichens— Age of lichens — Crusts — Mosses — Lava flows 

 of great eruptions — Colonizing plants — Krakatoa — Vesuvius — 

 Greenland volcanoes — Sumatra — Shale-heaps — Foreigners on rail- 

 way lines — Plants keep to their own grounds — Precipices and 

 rocks — Plants which change the scenery — Canons in America . 166 



CHAPTER XIV 



ON VEGETABLE DEMONS 



Animals and grass — Travellers in the elephant grass — Enemies in 

 Britain — Cactus versus rats and wild asses — Angora kids v. 

 acacia — The Wait-a-bit thorn — Palm roots and snails — Wild yam 

 V. pig — Larch v. goat — Portuguese and English gorse — Haw- 

 thorn V. rabbits — Briers, brambles, and barberry — The bramble 

 loop and sick children or ailing cows — Briers of the wilderness — 

 Theophrastus and Phrygian goats — Carline near the Pyramids — 

 Calthrops — Tragacanth — Hollies and their ingenious contri- 

 vances — How thorns and spines are formed — Tastes of animals . 177 



CHAPTER XV 



ON NETTLES, SENSITIVE PLANTS, ETC. 



Stinging nettles at home and abroad — The use of the nettle — Sham 

 nettles — Sensitive plants — Mechanism — Plants alive, under chloro- 

 form and ether — Telegraph plant — Woodsorrel — Have plants 

 nerves ? — Electricity in the Polar regions— Plants under electric 

 shocks — Currents of electricity in plants — The singing of trees 

 to the electro-magnetic ear — Experiments — Electrocution of 

 vegetables . . . . ... 191 



