KPiLoauR. 173 



of excellence up toward the mountain's crest, where beauty 

 dwells and toys with grace. Evolution sits sceptered in the 

 throne room of a carnation's life, it is ambushed with its embryo 

 in its seedbed of mealy albumen. Evolution hears the chimes of 

 loftier life, counts the units of heat, and li^ht that fate affords, 

 then mounts to the summit of their annual average. A law of 

 the universe is epitomized in this plant. The carnation is embodied 

 evolution. It enacts the law in pantomime and sing its song 

 without an accent. 



A grain of corn hides in its germ food for millions. There 

 are unborn forests in an acorn's cup, and a world of wonders cor- 

 ralled in a carnation's carpel. 



There is not an instance in the world's botany in which a 

 single variety of a genus of plants so completely absorbs the mer- 

 its of an Order, and all its cognate species, as does the carnation 

 There are but three species of the Dianthus genus of plants, be 

 sides Caryo))hyllus, that bear a flower worthy of a glance, D 

 Barbatus, D. Plumaiis, D. Cliinesiis, and their countless sports 

 The cognate relations of carnation are known as ragweed, star 

 wort, catchfly lychnis, ragged robin, stickey weed, sandwort, 

 mouse-eared pink, and scores of others too insignificant to sport 

 even a vulgar name, which the grace and beauty of Dianthus 

 Superba would entrance a seraph, if it was not gazing on a God. 



There never was a Satrap with as many poor relations, or a 

 Midas with such a multitude of impoverished peons. It is 

 sovereign over the realm of flowers and rules a world of weeds. 



There is a dynamic energy that centralizes stntimL-nt and 

 polarizes power. Every thing on earth tends to Alpine heights, or 

 to tartarean depths, to mirific^ force, or ravishing beauty. The 

 most chaotic contentions of life at last focalize themselves in a 

 single brain, condense their issues into edicts and leap in epi- 

 grams from fire-touched tongues. 



"Liberty or Death" is all there was between Lexington and 

 Yorktown. "Union and Liberty," between Sumpter and Appo- 

 mattox. 



