CHAPTER XIV 



ON VEGETABLE DEMONS 



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

 — Cactus vei'sus 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 — Hawthorn 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 contrivances — How thorns and spines are formed — 

 Tastes of animals. 



BY far the greater number of wild animals live by eating 

 vegetables. If one thinks of the elephant's trunk, 

 the teeth of a hippopotamus, or even of the jaws and 

 lips of mice, rats, and voles, the thoroughly practical character 

 and efficiency of their weapons become the more astonishing 

 the more one reflects upon them. 



Yet the defences adopted by plants are just as wonderful, 

 and are often most ingenious. 



It seems at first remarkable that the most usual food of 

 animals, grass, should be apparently unprotected. It is upon 

 grass that the great herds of bison, of buffalo, of antelope, 

 and guanaco, are or were supported. Yet grass is so wonder- 

 fully reproductive, produces such enormous quantities of 

 buds and foliage, and grows in such luxuriance, that there is 

 no fear of its being killed out. 



There are many places in the world where vegetation 

 M 177 



