20 THE CORN-FIELD. 



face in its bunches of cool fragrant flowers. Over 

 head, a lark, traced by its song, and only dis- 

 covered by its twinkling, is rejoicing in the love- 

 liness of the day. There is a fresh breeze astir, 

 and long waves are travelling across the field, 

 which seems as if it would no longer remain in 

 sluggish inactivity, but would wish, like the bee 

 and butterfly skimming on its surface, to start 

 into moving life. Every stem is bending and im- 

 mediately recovering its former position. There 

 are no broad leaves to offer resistance to the 

 wind, and so ensure destruction to the plants 

 which bear them ; but the breeze searches for a 

 way everywhere, and everywhere finds it, supping 

 up or scattering the wet, and rendering the refresh- 

 ed grain fit to receive the genial rays of the sun. 



When you study botany for yourself, you will 

 learn why it is essential to the perfect growth of 

 plants that their leaves should be exposed to the 

 wind, and why the flowers should not be encum- 

 bered with excessive moisture ; why it is ordained 

 that the bee should ask for nourishment from the 

 flowers of plants, and not from the leaves ; and 

 why sun, rain, and wind are all necessary to 

 ensure the ripening of so inconsiderable a thing 

 in the creation as a grain of wheat. For the pre- 

 sent, I must content myself with telling you that 

 these things have been thus ordered by Him who 

 has declared that " while the earth remaineth, 

 seed-time and harvest, and cold and heat, and sum- 

 mer and winter, and day and night, shall not cease." 



It has been said already, that the various kinds 

 of grass, including wheat, barley, and other sorts 

 of corn, are eminently useful to man, by supplying 

 either him or the domestic animals with food. 



