THE CORN-FIELD. 17 



farmer rather than of the botanist ; but both may 

 discover how little the labour of man would avail 

 unless One wiser and mightier than he interfered 

 in particulars, to which human wisdom and power 

 cannot reach. In order that the produce of a 

 country may be in any degree proportionate to 

 the wants of its inhabitants, it is necessary that 

 such produce should be abundant ; that is, if corn 

 be cultivated, that a great quantity should grow 

 in a small space. The plants which produce corn, 

 therefore, should be very close together. But, in 

 order that a large number of stems may grow in 

 a small space, it is further necessary that they 

 should be slender, so as not to take up much 

 room, and they ought also to be strong enough 

 to resist the wind and to sustain the weight of the 

 swelling grain, or the husbandman's labour would 

 be expended in vain. We will examine the beau- 

 tiful contrivances of God's providence, by which 

 all these objects are effected. The ears of corn 

 (we must attend to these first, for to them all the 

 other parts of the plant are subservient) are just 

 so far distant from each other that every one has 

 free access to air, rain, and the light of the sun, 

 without shading its neighbour; they are all of 

 nearly an equal height, consequently none are 

 injured by being overtopped by more robust 

 plants, and none liable to be snapped off by sud- 

 den gusts of wind, from lifting their heads above 

 the rest of the crop. The stems, unlike those of 

 the greater number of herbaceous plants, are not 

 solid throughout, but consist of hollow tubes, 

 strengthened here and there by stout swelling 

 joints, and the lower part of each tube is encased 

 by the base of a leaf. One might very naturally 



