34 GLIMPSED INTO PLANT-LIFE 



another of these minute plants, and consists of 

 oval cells which multipl}- with great rapidity when 

 placed in a pan of flour, and kept in a warm 

 atmosphere. 



By the careful study of these lower forms of 

 vegetable life, Tasteur, Koch, Frankland, and 

 others ha\c discoxered and classified the germs 

 or microbes,! as they are called, which gi\e rise to 

 various diseases. In books upon the subject, their 

 different shapes are figured as they appear when 

 immensely magnified, so that we can see that which 

 will give rise to consumption, erysipelas, or cholera, 

 and one reads with deep wonderment of all that 

 science has ascertained of late years as to the 

 presence in the air of these seeds of disease 

 which are ever floating more or less around us. 

 Rut for the restraining hand of God, it appears 

 as if universal sickness and death would be our 

 fate. 



Leaving these lower forms of growth, we may 

 consider the three divisions into which plants are 

 naturally classed as to their duration of life. 



Annuals are those which grow and flower, and 



' Small living atoms. 



