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THE FLORAL WORLD AND GARDEN GUIDE. 



corn, that can be given to horses. The seeds are of immense value 

 as food for horses and poultry, but should be mixed with other corn. 

 Finally, the juice of the plant will coagulate milk, without giving it 

 any unpleasant flavour. In Sweden the plant is cultivated for cattle 

 feed, and in Scotland it is forced as a table vegetable. 



The sting of the nettle is a first-rate microscopic object. It may 

 be easily removed from the stem by meaus of a sharp knife, and 

 when submitted to examination will be found to be constructed as 

 represented in the accompanying figure. It consists of a sharp 

 pointed tube filled with a pellucid fluid, which is secreted by a little 



STING OF COMMON KETTLE. 



STING OF WASP. 



gland at the base, and there held in reserve for use. It will be well 

 to compare it with the sting of a wasp, which is easily obtained. 

 This is formed of a long taper process, furnished at the base with 

 cells and glands, and on each side arise jointed arms, the end joints 

 being covered with hairs. The end of the sting is flattened and 

 pointed, and one side is serrated, so that it combines the features of 

 the dagger and the saw, and being hollow and connected with glands 

 that secrete an irritant poison, it is, in its way, a more formidable 

 weapon of war than man has ever designed, though his best facul- 

 ties of brain and hand have been, time out of mind, directed to the 

 production of engines of ofience. 



The nettle supplies food to several insects, but notably to the 

 beautiful nettle butterfly, Tanessa tirtica, the ugly caterpillars of 

 which may now be found in great abundance on the plant. In a 

 delightful article on the subject published in the first volume of 



