THE VOICES OF FLOWERS. 15 



shall form both cells and soil, that the future plant may crown 

 that rock with a deeper and stronger verdure than before. 

 Thus will they work, until in time that cragged mass of lava 

 shall yield before its quiet conquerors, and, crumbling into 

 dust, become the fit soil for the growth of trees and forests. 

 Thus in many regions the sun and showers alone combine 

 with plants to reduce large rocks to soil. 



Where there is life at all on the earth, it seems first to have 

 been vegetable life. Little plants, like pioneers, have gone 

 forth to prepare the way, and animal life has followed. 



But if we will follow all vegetation, we must prepare to 

 leave the surface of the land and wander for beneath that 

 surface, into the depths of caves and fissures and mines. 

 Clothing even the stalactites of caverns I have found vegeta 

 tion, which under the microscope exhibited all the beauteous 

 branching forms and roots of plants which grow beneath 

 the light of day. And then they crowd into life between 

 the rocks and rubbish of mines, apparently satisfied to live 

 where no ray of light has ever penetrated. 



There is yet another region, whose vegetation is as varied 

 and mysterious in its life and beauty as that which holds 

 its empire on the land. This region is that of the waters, 

 where vegetation assumes a form and character modified by 

 the nature of the new world in which it appears; but in 

 its necessities, its tenacity of life, its beauty of form and color, 

 and its wandering travels, it is still the same. Some sea-plants 

 are so similar to those of the land that in branch and color we 

 immediately see a mutual likeness. Others take upon them the 



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