I So SAGACITY A ND MORA LIT Y OF PLANTS. 



of prudence and thoughtfulness has been developed 

 to an extraordinary degree ; and these principles had 

 attained their stereotyped perfection ages before the 

 appearance of man upon the earth. There is not a 

 single flowering plant which does not leave a legacy 

 to its descendants, in the store of nutriment as- 

 sociated with its seeds ! 



The value of such a vegetable fortune varies to 

 a degfree almost human. Some have a rich store, 

 like the embryo of the Cocoa-nut, which feeds on the 

 well-known rich white flesh within the shell, until 

 its radicle penetrates one of the three well-known 

 " monkey eyes " at the end. The germ plants of 

 the Beans, Peas, Vetches, Oaks, Hazels, Walnuts, 

 Brazil-nuts, etc., are also rich in a substantial legacy 

 of food-material, carefully hoarded up by the parent 

 plants in the lobes or cotyledons, etc., of the seeds. 

 Even when these lobes are not thick and fleshy as 

 in the Bean and Acorn, they are surrounded by a 

 special provision of albumen and starch foods. Some 

 embryo-plants are well off ; others are poor. Those 

 of the Mustard, Cress, Poppy, Nettle, and many 

 other seedling plants, for instance, are provided with 

 so slender a fortune that it is soon exhausted, and 

 the seed-lobes have to develop chlorophyll and be- 

 come green, as we see them when we sow our 

 Mustard-and-cress on damped flannel. If the seed- 

 lobes did not immediately turn to and work like 

 fully developed ordinary leaves, the embryos of such 



